School Segregation Research Articles

Tackling school segregation with transportation network interventions: an agent-based modelling approach

We address the emerging challenge of school segregation within the context of free school choice systems. Households take into account both proximity and demographic composition when deciding on which schools to send their children to, potentially exacerbating residential segregation. This raises an important question: can we strategically intervene in transportation networks to enhance school access and mitigate segregation? In this paper, we propose a novel, network agent-based model to explore this question. Through simulations in both synthetic and real-world networks, we demonstrate that enhancing school accessibility via transportation network interventions can lead to a reduction in school segregation, under specific conditions. We introduce group-based network centrality measures and show that increasing the centrality of certain neighborhood nodes with respect to a transportation network can be an effective strategy for strategic interventions. We conduct experiments in two synthetic network environments, as well as in an environment based on real-world data from Amsterdam, the Netherlands. In both cases, we simulate a population of representative agents emulating real citizens’ schooling preferences, and we assume that agents belong to two different groups (e.g., based on migration background). We show that, under specific homophily regimes in the population, school segregation can be reduced by up to 35%. Our proposed framework provides the foundation to explore how citizens’ preferences, school capacity, and public transportation can shape patterns of urban segregation.

Individual and regional differences in the effects of school racial segregation on Black students’ health

BackgroundSchool racial segregation in the US has risen steadily since the 1990s, propelled by Supreme Court decisions rolling back the legacy of Brown v. Board. Quasi-experimental research has shown this resegregation harms Black students' health. However, whether individual or family characteristics (e.g., higher family incomes) are protective against segregation's health harms—or whether segregation is more damaging in regions of the US with fewer public sector investments—remains unclear. We leverage the quasi-random timing of school districts being released from Brown-era integration plans to examine heterogeneity in the association between resegregation and Black students' health. Methods & findingsWe took an instrumental variables approach, using the timing of integration order releases as an instrument for school segregation and analyzing a pre-specified list of theoretically-motivated modifiers in the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. In sensitivity analyses, we fit OLS models that directly adjusted for relevant covariates. Results suggest resegregation may have been particularly harmful in the South, where districts resegregated more quickly after order releases. We find little evidence that the effects of school segregation differed across family income, gender, or age. ConclusionThe end of court-ordered integration threatens the health of Black communities—especially in the US South. Modestly higher incomes do not appear protective against school segregation's harms. Research using larger samples and alternative measures of school segregation—e.g., between districts, instead of within districts—may further our understanding of segregation's health effects, especially in Northern states.

Pupils’ right to inclusion in an urban Finnish lower secondary school: a Bernsteinian analysis of pupils’ social relations

Finnish schools are famous for their egalitarian principles, but they face challenges related to pupils’ equal opportunities and, more broadly, democratic schooling. In this article, we examine the lived consequences of a growing challenge, school segregation, using Basil Bernstein’s concepts of inclusion and classification. Our analysis is based on ethnographic data produced in a lower secondary school located in a relatively disadvantaged residential area in the metropolitan area of Helsinki, Finland. First, we explore how the classification of pupils from different social class and ethnic backgrounds is present in the school. Second, we analyse how the strength of this classification affects pupils’ right to inclusion. We conclude that weak boundaries between pupils, and thus weak classification, construct an inclusive school community. However, the different categories—social class, ethnicity or other—intersect, and the strength of their classification varies, which in turn affects pupils’ peer relations and feelings of belonging.

UPHOLDING THE LEADERSHIP LESSONS OF THE LITTLE ROCK NINE

AbstractThe author, Leader to Leader’s editor‐in‐chief, reflects on how her father was a member of the 327th Infantry Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army, and as such had an important role in US history. She notes that in 1957, “President Dwight D. Eisenhower issued Executive Order 10730 sending my father’s regiment to Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas to maintain order as the school was desegregated.” This Executive Order “placed the Arkansas National Guard under federal authority and sent 1,000 US Army troops to Little Rock to enforce the US Supreme Court’s 1954 ruling in Brown v. the Board of Education that US State laws establishing segregation in public schools are unconstitutional, even if the segregated schools are otherwise equal in quality.” She relates that her father “ … remembers feeling the volatility of the situation that did not ignite, he believes, because of the discipline and presence of the 101st.” These thoughts resonated with her as she later interviewed the retired Army General Dennis J. Reimer, who in the 1990s was Chief of Staff of the United States Army, for her forthcoming documentary about our journal’s founder, Frances Hesselbein.

What to Compare When Comparing Inequalities in Educational Systems? Beyond School Disparities, Social Reproduction

Objective: International comparisons influence educational policies, but their foundations are seldom examined. The academic dimension is emphasized, despite the goal of integrating youth into the social and economic life of most countries. This research supports this perspective and aims to assess the role of educational systems in the reproduction of social inequalities in Latin America. Theoretical Framework: The research is grounded in the theories of social reproduction and conflict, addressing concepts such as school segregation and the valuation of diplomas in social mobility. Method: A qualitative and comparative methodology was adopted, focusing on the educational systems of Latin America. It was structured into four components: literature review, comparative analysis, analysis of public data, and synthesis of findings. Data collection involved the analysis of secondary data. Results and Discussion: The results revealed persistent educational inequalities in the region, such as school segregation and differences in diploma valuation. The discussion highlighted how schools and diplomas perpetuate social inequalities, influencing the social and economic trajectories of young people. Research Implications: It emphasizes the need to evaluate educational systems beyond academic performance, considering their impact on social integration. It underscores the urgency of reforms for inclusion, equity, and intersectoral collaboration. Originality/Value: This study offers a new perspective on educational inequality in Latin America, examining the impact of school segregation and diploma valuation on social mobility. It enriches academic dialogue and educational practices.

A data-driven agent-based model of primary school segregation in Amsterdam

ABSTRACT Theoretical agent-based models of residential and school choice have shown that substantial segregation can emerge as an (unintended) consequence of interactions between individual households and feedback mechanisms, despite households being relatively tolerant. However, for school choice, existing models have mostly been highly stylized, leaving open whether they are relevant for understanding school segregation in concrete empirical settings. To bridge this gap, this study develops an empirically calibrated agent-based model focusing on primary school choice in Amsterdam. Consistent with existing models, results show that substantial school segregation emerges when schools are chosen based on a trade-off between composition and distance, and also when households are relatively tolerant. Additionally, findings of (hypothetical) policy simulations suggest that it is important to understand which preferences for school composition and distance households have and how these interact. We find that the effects of policies aiming to reduce school segregation through geographical restricting mechanisms are highly dependent on those interacting preferences. Also, we assessed the contribution of residential segregation to school segregation. Our findings may have implications for methodologies aiming to estimate school choice preferences, such as discrete choice models, as these methodologies do not explicitly control for implications of these interactions and feedback mechanisms, which might lead to incorrect inference.

Achievement or Social Background? The Impact of Tracking on the Composition of Schools in an International Comparison

Abstract This study explores the implications of early between-school tracking within educational systems – a practice that involves sorting students into different educational pathways based on their achievement levels. We examine two potential effects of this process: (i) the promotion of homogeneous learning environments through tracking, and (ii) the potential for tracking to exacerbate social segregation among schools. To scrutinize these effects, we analyze data from the assessment studies PISA, TIMSS, and PIRLS (1995–2019). Additionally, we investigate whether school selectivity influences the tracking effects. Using difference-in-differences models combined with multiverse analyses, our findings demonstrate that early between-school tracking indeed contributes to the homogeneity of learning environments and can lead to increased social school segregation. However, our results do not indicate a moderating role of school selectivity.

Opportunity Hoarding and Elite Reproduction: School Segregation in Post-Apartheid South Africa

Abstract School integration is an important indicator of equality of opportunity and racial reconciliation in contemporary South Africa. Despite its prominence in public and political discourse, however, there is no systemic evidence on the levels and patterns of school segregation. Drawing on the literature on the post-apartheid political settlement and sociological theories of opportunity hoarding, we explain how the small White minority and, to a lesser extent, the new Black middle class monopolized access to South Africa’s most prestigious schools following the abolition of de jure segregation in 1994. Using the 2021 Annual School Survey—an administrative dataset covering all South African schools—and the 2019 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study school survey, we find very high levels of school segregation along racial as well as socioeconomic lines. White students almost exclusively attend former White schools, have little exposure to the low-income Black majority, and are vastly overrepresented in elite public and private schools. We argue that in South Africa and other contexts with under-resourced education systems, elite capture of the few high-performing schools serves to reproduce race and class privilege.

Fire on the Bayou: The Status of School Orchestra and String Programs in Louisiana

This study examined the status of school orchestra and string programs in Louisiana. A manual web search for string programs in parish school districts, student school affiliations from honor orchestra lists, Louisiana members of the American String Teachers Association (ASTA), and members of the Louisiana Music Educators Association was conducted to determine the approximate number of programs in the state. These data were cross-referenced with available data from the Louisiana Department of Education, which listed course offerings by school. A total of 44 teachers serving 97 schools were identified. Semi-structured interviews were then conducted with five-string teachers and two district arts coordinators from around the state to determine the strengths of current string programs and opportunities for growth. Findings from participant interviews revealed the legacy of school segregation, inadequate funding for public education, competition from non-public schools, and the challenges of maintaining program infrastructure due to limited funding and perennial natural disasters. The results of this study were compared with other statewide string program surveys to situate Louisiana string programs in a national context with implications for string teachers, music teacher education, and professional development offered.

Realizing the Solidarity Dividend: A New Story for Educational Leadership

ABSTRACT Long Island has long maintained the most segregated suburban school system in America. In this case study, we used McGhee’s zero sum vs. solidarity dividend framework to qualitatively examine a group of 42 leaders’ perceptions of school segregation on Long Island as well as how they imagined possible solutions. Findings show that most leaders believed that the current system is unfair but unchangeable, and did not put forth possible solutions, nor, crucially, challenge the underlying zero sum, meritocratic status quo. However, we also highlight examples of leaders who espoused the need to create bridges among racially diverse districts and communities, acting in different ways to uplift the ideals of solidarity. We offer a three-part bridging framework that moves from rhetorical bridging, naming disconnectedness and its harms; through worldview bridging, connecting disparate racialized realities; to community bridging, actively stepping into new relationships and shared spaces. This research shows how important community-facing culturally responsive school leadership is when setting the narrative about racial inclusivity and integration, as well as in shaping the policy reform process. Instead of waiting for necessary top-down changes, we argue that leaders must act now to bring worldviews and communities together for the common good.

Association Between Changes in Racial Residential and School Segregation and Trends in Racial Health Disparities, 2000-2020: A Life Course Perspective.

Most studies of the relationship between racial segregation and racial health disparities have focused on residential segregation. School-based racial segregation is an additional form of segregation that may be associated with racial disparities in health. This study examines the relationship between both residential segregation and school segregation and racial health disparities among non-Hispanic Black compared to non-Hispanic White persons at the county level in the United States. It also examines the relationship between changes in residential and school segregation and subsequent trajectories in a variety of racial health disparities across the life course. Using the CDC WONDER Multiple Case of Death database, we derived an annual estimate of race-specific death rates and rate ratios for each county during the period 2000-2020. We then examined the relationship between baseline levels of residential and school segregation in 1991 as well as changes between 1991-2000 and the trajectories of the observed racial health disparities between 2000 and 2020. We used latent trajectory analysis to identify counties with similar patterns of residential and school segregation over time and to identify counties with similar trajectories in each racial health disparity. Outcomes included life expectancy, early mortality (prior to age 65), infant mortality, firearm homicide, total homicide, and teenage pregnancy rates. During the period 1991-2020, racial residential segregation remained essentially unchanged among the 1051 counties in our sample; however, racial school segregation increased during this period. Increases in school segregation from 1991 to 2000 were associated with higher racial disparities in each of the health outcomes during the period 2000-2020 and with less progress in reducing these disparities. This paper provides new evidence that school segregation is an independent predictor of racial health disparities and that reducing school segregation-even in the face of high residential segregation-could have a long-term impact on reducing racial health disparities. Furthermore, it suggests that the health consequences of residential segregation have not been eliminated from our society but are now being exacerbated by a new factor: school-based segregation. Throughout this paper, changes in school-based segregation not only show up as a consistent significant predictor of greater racial disparities throughout the life course, but at times, an even stronger predictor of health inequity than residential segregation.

Magneettikouluja vai eliittikouluja?

The connection between urban and school segregation has been identified as a major question in Finnish educational policy. Families’ school choices in basic education are strongly connected to socio-spatial segregation, families’ socio-economic status, and the provision of selective tracks and streams in schools. As a result, the provision of selective schools and selective classes is a major factor shaping the landscape of urban school segregation. We have analyzed whether the geographical placement of selective education in the City of Helsinki can be identified to either ameliorate school segregation through a “magnet school” effect or exacerbate segregation through “elite school” placement. Our results demonstrate that the provision of selective schools and classes in public schools is in general geographically very equally distributed, and as such does not construct a magnet school effect. However, as the placement of private schools has a distinct “elite” pattern, the educational landscape of the city leans towards a slight “elite effect”.

Attendance Boundary Policies and the Limits to Combating School Segregation

What is the efficacy of redrawing school attendance boundaries as a desegregation policy? To provide causal evidence on this question, we employ novel data with unprecedented detail on the universe of Danish children and exploit changes in attendance boundaries over time. Households defy reassignments to schools with lower socioeconomic status. There is a strong social gradient in defiance, as resourceful households are more sensitive to the student composition of new schools. We simulate school assignment policies and find that boundary changes that reassign areas to a highly disadvantaged school are ineffective at altering the socioeconomic composition at the disadvantaged school. (JEL D31, H75, I21, I24, I28, R23)

The impact of marketization on school segregation and educational equity and effectiveness: Evidence from Australia and Canada

While marketization has been promoted as a mechanism for improving educational equity and effectiveness, substantial evidence suggests that it may have the opposite effect. We contribute to this debate by examining educational equity and effectiveness in two similar countries that have embraced educational marketization to different degrees. Drawing on data from the Program for International Student Assessment and a causal-comparative design, we show that Australian schooling has more choice and competition, is more socially segregated, has larger school stratification of human and material resources, and has greater inequalities of educational outcomes and overall lower effectiveness than Canadian schooling. Our findings suggest that educational marketization reduces educational equity and effectiveness by increasing school social segregation and stratification of resources.

School segregation and social processes that shape early and middle childhood development

De facto school segregation, stemming from structural racism, has myriad consequences for children’s development. Extant research documents the implications of segregated schools for children’s academic resources and opportunities, but there is less attention on the social processes that unfold as a result of school segregation, particularly in early and middle childhood. Social processes–including ethnic-racial socialization, stereotyping and prejudice, and intergroup contact–are important mechanisms wherein school segregation affects academic and social development, thereby upholding a recursive cycle of structural racism. We synthesize cross-disciplinary theoretical and empirical research to propose a conceptual framework for how school segregation relates to social processes that shape early and middle childhood development. We conclude with reflections and future directions including prioritizing the social benefits and costs of desegregation for minoritized children, expanding research within an intersectional framework, accounting for structural inequities and injustice in child development research more broadly, and implications for education and learning.

Racial Change in Suburbia: America’s Diversifying Elementary Districts and Their Effect on School Segregation

The ethnic and racial makeup of the United States has changed during the last several decades. Scholars have qualitatively shown how these changes affect school districts but have not identified their scale. We examine residential demographic change using a novel dataset derived from a geographic technique that leverages satellite imagery with 2000 and 2020 census data. We then analyze the effects of demographic change on student isolation and dissimilarity in elementary school districts. Our findings indicate that most elementary districts have changed, but the changes are uneven. The number of districts with White student intense isolation declined, particularly in suburban locales. Meanwhile, districts with student of color intense isolation increased, particularly in urban locales. These changes indicate that increasing diversity for White students has coincided with greater isolation for students of color. These findings should prompt scholars to reconsider their conceptualization of suburban school districts.

Between Integration and Freedom: School Segregation in Critical Perspective

Between Integration and Freedom: School Segregation in Critical Perspective

The Battle Nearer to Home: The Persistence of School Segregation in New York City

The Battle Nearer to Home: The Persistence of School Segregation in New York City

ASSOCIATION OF CHILDHOOD EXPOSURE TO SCHOOL RACIAL SEGREGATION WITH LATE-LIFE COGNITION AMONG AMERICAN ADULTS

Abstract Racial segregation may contribute to enduringly worse health outcomes and aging. Prior research mainly focuses on residential segregation, yet the long-term effects of school segregation and the effects for different racial/ethnic groups are largely unknown. Linking measures of primary school segregation using administrative data with a nationally representative population survey in the US, we examine how childhood exposure to school racial segregation shapes the late-life cognitive function. 23,752 non-Hispanic White (White), 6,364 non-Hispanic Black (Black) American adults aged 50 and older were identified from the Health and Retirement Study; and state-level school dissimilarity indexes in late 1960s were linked to participants’ latest wave of cognitive assessment using childhood residence. Multivariate regression analyses demonstrated that exposure to White-Black school segregation had strong, negative effects on cognitive outcomes for both White and Black participants. One standard deviation increase in dissimilarity index was associated with lower cognitive score (White: = -0.16 [95%CI, -0.22, -0.11]; Black: = -0.42 [95%CI, -0.53, -0.30]) and more cognitive impairment (White: Odds Ratio (OR) = 1.10 [95%CI, 1.06, 1.13]; Black: OR = 1.21 [95%CI, 1.14, 1.27]) adjusting for age and sex. Educational attainment and other socioeconomic characteristics explained most associations (40-70%), and the effects remained significant even after accounting for a rich set of late-life factors. Overall, these findings suggest that childhood exposure to school segregation has long-lasting effects on late-life cognition for both White and Black Americans. Educational policy and reform should be promoted to reduce school racial segregation within and between school districts to address health inequities.

Understanding school segregation through micro-changes: evidence from upper secondary education in Stockholm

ABSTRACT Previous studies investigating how the school choice paradigm shapes school segregation have found that students’ ethnic school preferences drive school segregation by leading students to rank and change current schools following ethnic homophily orientations. This study investigates an intermediate moment in which these preferences contribute to the exacerbation of school segregation: students changing schools after being allocated to following admission rules but before the start of the academic year. We refer to these changes as micro-changes. Using Swedish register data on 9th-grade students applying to upper secondary education in Stockholm schools, this study evaluates how micro-changes affect school segregation. Our findings reveal that micro-changes are not neutral and increase school segregation levels because (1) students tend to reject of schools with a low share of in-group members and low representation of 9th-grade classmates, and (2) micro-changers move into schools with a high share of in-group members and 9th-grade classmates. Furthermore, our simulation model shows that micro-changes impact on school segregation have a cumulative effect.