Quality Of Public Schooling Research Articles

Ethnic school segregation in Copenhagen: A step in the right direction?

The Danish school system is based on a general belief in the quality and merits of public schooling. Until 20 years ago, more than 90% of all children attended public school. However, this trend has recently seen a decline because of rising spatial inequalities; nowhere is this more visible than in the major cities, particularly Copenhagen. One visible change has been the rise in the number of children with non-Danish backgrounds in public schools in major cities. Previous studies of Copenhagen showed that, while the level of ethnic residential segregation was moderate, the level of school segregation was remarkably high. The purpose of this paper is to revisit the case of Copenhagen through: (a) quantitatively identifying the level of ethnic school segregation in Copenhagen and the change over the last decade, and (b) qualitatively analysing the considerations regarding the school choice of parents in an ethnically diverse district. The paper identifies decreasing levels of ethnic school segregation in public schools but a markedly higher and increasing level in private schools. The qualitative material points to still-existing concerns regarding specific public schools with high proportions of pupils of non-Danish backgrounds as well as to parents who choose to overlook such concerns and opt for the local public school.

Inequality, educational choice, and public school quality in income‐mixing communities

AbstractWhy, in some urban communities, do rich and poor households cohabit while, in others, we observe sorting by income? Does income inequality impact residential choices and community segregation? To answer these questions, I develop a two‐community general equilibrium framework of school quality, residential choice, and tax decision with probabilistic voting. The model predicts that an equilibrium with income mixing in which households segregate across public schools and low‐ and high‐income households choose to live in the same community might emerge in highly unequal societies. In this particular equilibrium, income‐mixing communities perform lower public school quality than communities populated by middle‐income households. The effect of inequality on the quality of public schooling in the income‐mixing community is ambiguous and depends on the relative endowments of private goods, such as housing, in the two communities.

Champions of the poor or “militant fighters for a better pay cheque”? Teacher unionism in Mexico and South Africa, 1979–2013

There are some fascinating historical parallels between Mexico’s giant teacher union, the Mexican National Education Union, and the South African Democratic Teachers Union. Although both teacher unions played an important role in challenging political oligarchies at certain points in their history, they became increasingly protectionist. Through their close affiliation to ruling parties, they were able to wield substantial political influence. In both of these cases, the unions played a controversial role in preventing central government surveillance and intervention in schools. Arguably, this often allowed not only for corruption in appointments and promotions, but also the protection of negligent teachers. There is some evidence to suggest that in protecting their sectional interests, both unions have frequently alienated parents and students at the community level. This paper addresses broader debates about the impact of powerful teacher unions on the quality of public schooling.

Outside In: Communities in Action for Education Reform

Community organizing for school reform is a growing national phenomenon, as young people, parents, neighborhood residents, and faith-based institutions struggle to improve the quality and equity of public schooling, particularly in urban school districts. Now a decade old, community organizing projects are influencing local public schools in increasingly visible ways—bringing new resources, introducing equity-based policies, and transforming educator conceptions of who they teach and the skills necessary to teach diverse student populations effectively. This article looks at the emerging field of community organizing for school reform in the context of national trends in public education, reviews the characteristics and theoretical underpinnings of the organizing approach, and explores the linkages between research, the teaching profession, and organizing. It identifies three critical questions for educators and researchers, and concludes with a brief discussion of the need for more research on how community-driven reform efforts are helping to improve student learning.

A Realm Without Angels: MENC's Partnerships with Disney and Other Major Corporations

My interest in partnerships between the MENC: The National Association for Music Educators and major corporations such as Disney dates back to 1 996 when I was invited to attend a free premiere screening of the movie Mr. Holland's Opus.1 Never one to turn down anything free, in January of that year I joined more than twenty-five thousand music educators, administrators, and friends of the arts, who gathered at fiftyone locations across the nation to watch the movie. Sponsored and promoted by the National Coalition for Music Education, of which MENC is a member, in cooperation with the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences Foundation, the American Music Conference, and Hollywood Pictures (a Disney subsidiary), the promotional screening was the result of an education/business partnership. I did not like the film much even though I agreed with its message that public schools and public school music should be adequately funded, and I was sorry that MENC had entered into a partnership to promote it. Part of the problem may have been timing. I had recently returned from a parental leave during which I had suffered serious postpartum complications and had struggled for nearly a year with poor health. January 1996 found me trying to figure out how I would manage a full-blown academic career, my still fragile health, and a lively child. I bristled at the visions of professionalism fostered by Mr. Holland 's Opus, recognizing that I would never again have the luxury he did of indulging myself uninterruptedly in my career; I knew that I might never again be seen as a real professional even though I was more exhausted and working harder than I ever had. From my perspective the film's images of teachers, teaching, and professionalism were profoundly masculinist; I also knew that a popular film can play a powerful role in shaping public imaginaries. Who tends to benefit from the perpetuation of these images of teachers, teaching, and professionalism, I wondered? Who tends to be harmed? So my first step on this journey was to write a critique of Mr. Holland's Opus. I soon discovered that the film itself was but one small part of a much larger story about MENC's deepening involvement in education/business partnerships. One of the main themes of Mr. Holland 's Opus is that budget cuts can have devastating effects on music programs. The education/business partnership forged to promote Opus and the manner in which the film was promoted suggested that the corporate world is socially responsible and genuinely concerned both about the quality of American education and the demise of music education. In no way did they intimate that corporate practices may be at least partially responsible for any declines in the quality of public schooling. I was also aware, however, of a corpus of scholarship suggesting that recent trends toward corporate partnerships and philanthropy are window-dressing at a time when corporations are sneaking out the back door carrying everything else in the store. Critics contend that on the one hand, corporations engage in much publicized acts of gift-giving or school partnership, which cost the corporations relatively little (or in the case of Opus, result in considerable financial profit for the corporation), while on the other hand, they chisel away at the financial infrastructure of

The Schooling of Southern Blacks: The Roles of Legal Activism and Private Philanthropy, 1910-1960

Improvements in education and educational quality are widely acknowledged to be major contributors to black economic progress in the twentieth century. This paper investigates the sources of improvement in black education in the South in the first half of the century and demonstrates the important roles of social activism, especially NAACP litigation and private philanthropy, in improving the quality and availability of public schooling. Many scholars view education as a rival to social activism in explaining black economic progress, but such a view misses the important role of philanthropic and legal interventions in promoting education.

The Schooling of Southern Blacks: The Roles of Legal Activism and Private Philanthropy, 1910-1960

Improvements in education and educational quality are widely acknowledged to be major contributors to black economic progress in the Twentieth Century. This paper investigates the sources of improvement in black education in the South in the first half of the century and demonstrates the important roles of social activism, especially NAACP litigation and private philanthropy, in improving the quality and availability of public schooling. Many scholars view education as a rival to social activism in explaining black economic progress, but such a view misses the important role of philanthropic and legal interventions in promoting education.

A Further Note on Schools and Housing Values

This paper provides further evidence on the relationship between public schools and housing values. Drawing on data from the Los Angeles and San Francisco areas, the paper presents estimates of an Oates‐type model of community housing values. Included in the model are measures of both student achievement and racial composition. The quality of public schooling, as measured by reading achievement, is found to be a strong, statistically significant determinant of community housing values, independent of student racial mix or socioeconomic background. Estimates of the model suggest that changes in achievement scores have substantial impacts on community housing values.

Public Schools and Urban Development

Abstract This article explores the relationship between the quality of public schooling and the pattern of urban development. An examination of recent research and other evidence suggests that public school quality influences people's choice of housing and the price of residential housing. Concern for good schools appears to affect the location decisions of both black and white households. A review of educational research reveals a strong consensus that it is possible to increase significantly the academic performance of schoolchildren even in low-income urban neighborhoods. The article concludes that the success of efforts to make urban areas attractive to families with children is inextricably linked to the improvement of urban public education.

Desegregation planning and educational equity

Robert G. Newby College of Education Wayne State University Detroit, Michigan To be just, the American social order must seek equity for all its people. Judged by such a standard, American public schooling is our social order's most dramatic example of inequity. The best schooling is for white middle-class children, while the worst is for black poor children. Pupil performance data of the past decade, analyzed by race and social class, does not suggest any substantial improvement in the relationship between pupil performance and school response to pupil color and social class. How well children do in school depends on how fairly or unfairly schools respond to children of differing family backgrounds. Effective instruction for the children of the poor is not now, nor does it promise soon to be, a widespread characteristic of public schooling. Thus, those of us who seek equity in our social order must seize every opportunity to improve the quality of public schooling. The discussion that follows will make every effort to be clear and consistent in using the words integration, segregation, and desegregation. We define school integration as a setting in which blacks and whites meet as institutional equals with each having equal access to the rights and privileges that characterize the school. We define school segregation as the creation and maintenance of racially separate classrooms or buildings by the use of official sanctions. We define desegregation as the attempt to eliminate racial discrimination in the assigning of pupils to classrooms or buildings. Desegregation is most often attempted by planning for racial balance, which means assigning children to classrooms and buildings in approximate proportion to the overall racial composition of the school district. Our effort to be consistent in using these key words will be somewhat confounded by the confusing nature of their use in desegregation literature. Judges, attorneys, and social scientists have tended to define these words on the basis of their attitudes toward race. It is especially confusing to note that predominantly black schools are often defined as segregated without regard to how they came to be predominantly black. We hope not to contribute to such confusion. Court-ordered desegregation is usually the greatest opportunity for reform that occurs in urban school districts. That is so because school districts like Boston and Chicago seem capable of forever failing to educate children who are poor. The politics of educational decision-making in such school districts does not require school officials to be instructionally effective for children who are poor. Candidates for city council and school board who campaign on behalf of the poor rarely get elected. Efforts at neighborhood school reform are not usually successful in ways that 12 Theory Into Practice