School Choice in Urban America


Book Description

A contribution to educational policy debates which aims to blend issues of school choice, equity, parental involvement and desegregation in order to provide an analysis of the social and political context of magnet schools. The text also explores the experiences of students attending these schools.




What America Can Learn from School Choice in Other Countries


Book Description

This book draws out the critical lessons for U.S. policymakers and shows how freedom to choose schools and healthy competition among schools can create strong academic success.




Educational Freedom in Urban America


Book Description

This book offers a prescription for reform that includes freedom of choice among public and private schools.




Lost Classroom, Lost Community


Book Description

In the past two decades in the United States, more than 1,600 Catholic elementary and secondary schools have closed, and more than 4,500 charter schools—public schools that are often privately operated and freed from certain regulations—have opened, many in urban areas. With a particular emphasis on Catholic school closures, Lost Classroom, Lost Community examines the implications of these dramatic shifts in the urban educational landscape. More than just educational institutions, Catholic schools promote the development of social capital—the social networks and mutual trust that form the foundation of safe and cohesive communities. Drawing on data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods and crime reports collected at the police beat or census tract level in Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles, Margaret F. Brinig and Nicole Stelle Garnett demonstrate that the loss of Catholic schools triggers disorder, crime, and an overall decline in community cohesiveness, and suggest that new charter schools fail to fill the gaps left behind. This book shows that the closing of Catholic schools harms the very communities they were created to bring together and serve, and it will have vital implications for both education and policing policy debates.




Choosing Homes, Choosing Schools


Book Description

A series of policy shifts over the past decade promises to change how Americans decide where to send their children to school. In theory, the boom in standardized test scores and charter schools will allow parents to evaluate their assigned neighborhood school, or move in search of a better option. But what kind of data do parents actually use while choosing schools? Are there differences among suburban and urban families? How do parents’ choices influence school and residential segregation in America? Choosing Homes, Choosing Schools presents a breakthrough analysis of the new era of school choice, and what it portends for American neighborhoods. The distinguished contributors to Choosing Homes, Choosing Schools investigate the complex relationship between education, neighborhood social networks, and larger patterns of inequality. Paul Jargowsky reviews recent trends in segregation by race and class. His analysis shows that segregation between blacks and whites has declined since 1970, but remains extremely high. Moreover, white families with children are less likely than childless whites to live in neighborhoods with more minority residents. In her chapter, Annette Lareau draws on interviews with parents in three suburban neighborhoods to analyze school-choice decisions. Surprisingly, she finds that middle- and upper-class parents do not rely on active research, such as school tours or test scores. Instead, most simply trust advice from friends and other people in their network. Their decision-making process was largely informal and passive. Eliot Weinginer complements this research when he draws from his data on urban parents. He finds that these families worry endlessly about the selection of a school, and that parents of all backgrounds actively consider alternatives, including charter schools. Middle- and upper-class parents relied more on federally mandated report cards, district websites, and online forums, while working-class parents use network contacts to gain information on school quality. Little previous research has explored what role school concerns play in the preferences of white and minority parents for particular neighborhoods. Featuring innovative work from more than a dozen scholars, Choosing Homes, Choosing Schools adroitly addresses this gap and provides a firmer understanding of how Americans choose where to live and send their children to school.




Excluded by Choice


Book Description

Through powerful narratives of parents of Black and Latinx students with disabilities, this book provides a unique look at the relationship between disability, race, urban space, and market-driven educational policies. Offering significant insights into complex forms of educational exclusion, the text illustrates the actual challenges and paradoxes of school choice faced by today’s parents. Included are explanations for the kinds of injustices students with disabilities face every day, as well as resources that can be helpful for engaging in collective action aimed at improving educational services for all children. This accessible resource offers recommendations to help policymakers, charter school administrators, teachers, and families tackle the challenges of school choice while dealing effectively with the new generation of inclusive schools. Book Features: Presents a first-of-its-kind look at how Black and Latinx parents of students with disabilities experience market-driven approaches to education. Identifies the consequences of push-out practices in charter schools and how families experience and resist these practices. Situates school choice amid historical and compounding forms of exclusion associated with geographical (neighborhood) and social (disability, race, and class) locations. Provides lessons learned and valuable guidance for creating a new generation of inclusive charter schools.




When Middle-Class Parents Choose Urban Schools


Book Description

In recent decades a growing number of middle-class parents have considered sending their children to—and often end up becoming active in—urban public schools. Their presence can bring long-needed material resources to such schools, but, as Linn Posey-Maddox shows in this study, it can also introduce new class and race tensions, and even exacerbate inequalities. Sensitively navigating the pros and cons of middle-class transformation, When Middle-Class Parents Choose Urban Schools asks whether it is possible for our urban public schools to have both financial security and equitable diversity. Drawing on in-depth research at an urban elementary school, Posey-Maddox examines parents’ efforts to support the school through their outreach, marketing, and volunteerism. She shows that when middle-class parents engage in urban school communities, they can bring a host of positive benefits, including new educational opportunities and greater diversity. But their involvement can also unintentionally marginalize less-affluent parents and diminish low-income students’ access to the improving schools. In response, Posey-Maddox argues that school reform efforts, which usually equate improvement with rising test scores and increased enrollment, need to have more equity-focused policies in place to ensure that low-income families also benefit from—and participate in—school change.




The Economics of School Choice


Book Description

Now that the U.S. Supreme Court has declared school voucher programs constitutional, the many unanswered questions concerning the potential effects of school choice will become especially pressing. Contributors to this volume draw on state-of-the-art economic methods to answer some of these questions, investigating the ways in which school choice affects a wide range of issues. Combining the results of empirical research with analyses of the basic economic forces underlying local education markets, The Economics of School Choice presents evidence concerning the impact of school choice on student achievement, school productivity, teachers, and special education. It also tackles difficult questions such as whether school choice affects where people decide to live and how choice can be integrated into a system of school financing that gives children from different backgrounds equal access to resources. Contributors discuss the latest findings on Florida's school choice program as well as voucher programs and charter schools in several other states. The resulting volume not only reveals the promise of school choice, but examines its pitfalls as well, showing how programs can be designed that exploit the idea's potential but avoid its worst effects. With school choice programs gradually becoming both more possible and more popular, this book stands out as an essential exploration of the effects such programs will have, and a necessary resource for anyone interested in the idea of school choice.




Reinventing America's Schools


Book Description

From David Osborne, the author of Reinventing Government--a biting analysis of the failure of America's public schools and a comprehensive plan for revitalizing American education. In Reinventing America's Schools, David Osborne, one of the world's foremost experts on public sector reform, offers a comprehensive analysis of the charter school movements and presents a theory that will do for American schools what his New York Times bestseller Reinventing Government did for public governance in 1992. In 2005, when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans, the city got an unexpected opportunity to recreate their school system from scratch. The state's Recovery School District (RSD), created to turn around failing schools, gradually transformed all of its New Orleans schools into charter schools, and the results are shaking the very foundations of American education. Test scores, school performance scores, graduation and dropout rates, ACT scores, college-going rates, and independent studies all tell the same story: the city's RSD schools have tripled their effectiveness in eight years. Now other cities are following suit, with state governments reinventing failing schools in Newark, Camden, Memphis, Denver, Indianapolis, Cleveland, and Oakland. In this book, Osborne uses compelling stories from cities like New Orleans and lays out the history and possible future of public education. Ultimately, he uses his extensive research to argue that in today's world, we should treat every public school like a charter school and grant them autonomy, accountability, diversity of school designs, and parental choice.




Fixing Urban Schools


Book Description

Every year, in one out of three big cities, the school superintendent leaves his or her job, sending local community leaders back to square one. Cleveland, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., are struggling to recreate their failed school systems, and many more cities are likely to follow. City leaders need more than new superintendents. They need stable reform strategies strong enough to move an entrenched system. Unfortunately, it is not clear where they can turn for help. Education experts are deeply divided about whether teacher retraining or new standards are enough to reform a struggling city system, or whether more fundamental changes, such as family choice and family-run schools, are needed. Based on new research, this book identifies the essential elements of reform strategies that can transform school performance in big cities beset by poverty, social instability, racial isolation, and labor unrest. It also suggests ways that local leaders can assemble the necessary funding and political support to make such strategies work.