A PRRAC & Century Foundation Report (May 2012). By Richard D. Kahlenberg & Halley Potter. Excerpt: The education policy and philanthropy communities to date have placed a premium on funding charter schools that have high concentrations of poverty and large numbers of minority students. This report asks: Might it make more sense for foundations and policymakers to … [Read more...] about Diverse Charter Schools (PRRAC & Century Foundation, May 2012)
Housing/Education Nexus
There is a reciprocal relationship between residential segregation and segregated schools. Federal housing policy and historical patterns of housing segregation have created stark divides between wealthy, largely white communities with high property values and predominantly minority communities with more limited resources. Due to the local nature of school funding, communities with higher property value can generate more funding for schools, leading to more comprehensive educational resources and higher test scores, which in turn drives up the price of homes in the school district. In this way the socioeconomic and racial divisions between neighborhoods and schools perpetuate themselves in a vicious cycle. Just as residential and school segregation are mutually reinforcing, so too are the effects of residential and school integration. Children attending integrated schools are more likely to live in integrated neighborhoods as adults, and send their own children to integrated schools. The effects are reciprocal, working positively in both directions.
For more on PRRAC’s work on this topic, visit our page on the Housing-School Nexus.
Finding Common Ground: Coordinating Housing and Education Policy to Promote Integration (PRRAC & NCSD, October 2011).
A PRRAC-NCSD Report (October 2011). Edited by Philip Tegeler. Excerpt: Families who participated in the Baltimore Mobility Program experienced radical changes in their local neighborhood contexts, moving from poor and segregated areas to mixed race, low poverty communities. In this paper, we look at the changes in educational opportunity that accompanied these moves. Given … [Read more...] about Finding Common Ground: Coordinating Housing and Education Policy to Promote Integration (PRRAC & NCSD, October 2011).