Failing Another Generation: A Photo Essay

The 300,000 Roma in the Czech Republic face widespread and persistent discrimination—starting at school.

Roma children are funneled into so-called “practical schools”—dead-end institutions where they are taught a limited, low-level curriculum. Five years ago, the European Court of Human Rights demanded that the Czech government stop this segregation, after 18 children won a legal challenge to the system in a law suit known as D.H. and Others v. Czech Republic.

Yet, five years after the judgment, too many Roma children are still caught up in a sub-standard and discriminatory education system, with no chance to grasp the many opportunities that most other children take for granted.

The Open Society Justice Initiative commissioned photojournalist Stephanie Sinclair to document the stories of the original D.H.applicants — many of whom now have children of their own.