With tomorrow's dedication of the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial on Capitol Square, there's a lot of talk about the issue behind the new monument: public education.

At the Library of Virginia this afternoon, more than 400 people attended a symposium examining the state's schools more than 50 years after the student strike in Prince Edward County that, in part, led to the historic decision by the U.S. Supreme Court outlawing segregated schools.

More than a dozen panelists --among them, educators, judges, lawyers, business people and one of the participants of the 1951 protest --said public education has changed for the better, but now faces other problems.

They agreed, for example, that with the death of separate-but-equal, there's more taxpayer money, particularly, for troubled schools.

However, some of the panelists worried that too much is expected from teachers, who spend their days with students raised in single-parent homes and facing violence in the streets and classrooms.

The civil rights memorial will be dedicated tomorrow. Located a short distance from the Executive Mansion, it is a symbol of once-segregated Virginia's often-difficult embrace of equality.

-- Jeff Schapiro