This "Equity by Design" research brief discusses the impact of COVID-19 on school segregation and integration in public schools. COVID-19 raised a lot of discussions already occurring around school choice, which connects to a larger conversation on the purpose of education and it being one of the most important public goods in American…

New York City's school system is among the most diverse and segregated in the United States. Using difference-in-differences and placebo tests, we evaluate two desegregation policies in two geographic districts in New York City, District 3 and District 15. Both districts attempted to lower economic segregation within their district while…

This article examines the most recent trends on neighborhood racial integration in New York--the country's largest metropolitan area in 2019 with a total population of 19.2 million. We ask how the suburbanization of both immigration and poverty have transformed suburbs over the last two decades. We highlight four findings. First, ethnoracial…

In this ethnographic study, Alexandra Freidus investigates the dilemmas of whiteness that challenge a youth-led campaign for school integration in New York City. Analyzing field observations, interviews, and internal documents, she illustrates the ways whiteness shaped young people's identities as allies and activists, contributed to an…

School assignment in Boston and New York City came to national attention in the 1970s as courts across the country tried to integrate schools. Today, district-wide choice allows Boston and New York students to enroll far from home, perhaps enhancing integration. Urban school transportation is increasingly costly, however, and has unclear…

Research shows that socioeconomically, racially, and ethnically integrated schools can have important benefits for student learning. While much research has focused on the benefits of integrated K-12 settings, emerging evidence indicates that the benefit of school- and classroom-level diversity may also be significant in early childhood education…

Alongside the immediate challenges of operating schools during the COVID-19 pandemic, over the past year, parents, students, and policymakers around the country have also debated equity and access to some of the country's most elite and segregated public schools. This qualitative case study examines how New York City activists conceptualized…

In cities across the United States, affluent White newcomers are moving into historically Black neighborhoods, presenting both a challenge and an opportunity for public schools. In many cases, the newcomers either avoid their local schools or use their political power to push aside families who have lived in the neighborhood for years. But there's…

School assignment in Boston and New York City came to national attention in the 1970s as courts across the country tried to integrate schools. Today, district-wide choice allows Boston and New York students to enroll far from home. Although 1970s desegregation efforts likely benefited minority students, urban school transportation is increasingly…

This is the policy brief for the discussion paper, "Still Worth the Trip? School Busing Effects in Boston and New York." While choice systems offer students in segregated neighborhoods access to schools that may be more integrated and of higher quality, does busing lead to improved academic performance as measured by higher test scores…

December 1, 2015, marked the 60th anniversary of Rosa Parks' arrest for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a Montgomery bus in 1955. This incident sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the mid-20th century civil rights movement. A century before Parks' act of resistance, African American schoolteacher Elizabeth Jennings was…

Reflecting on his own experiences attending integrated schools in the 1960s and 70s, scholar Pedro Noguera argues that, despite the challenges involved, school integration remains essential for providing better educational opportunities for students. At a time when our nation is becoming irreversibly more diverse, Noguera writes, the country's…

While U.S. public education is experiencing an increase in student body size and diversity, there is also an increase in racial and socioeconomic isolation. Participation rates among White students are decreasing as rates among Latine and Asian American and Pacific Islander students increase, and Black student participation rates hold steady.…

Public schools have always been meant to provide all children with the skills and knowledge to become successful participants in the economy. But currently, a second important purpose of public education has become more salient: to promote social cohesion in a diverse and fractured democracy. As ugly and naked racism in America is further…

Since the first charter school law passed in Minnesota in 1991, over 40 states and the District of Columbia have passed laws allowing the publicly funded, privately managed, and semiautonomous schools of choice. Ever since the first charter school opened in Minnesota in 1992, the battle for fair funding has raged across the land. On the one hand,…