This article examines how student movements between traditional public schools (TPSs) and charters—both brick and mortar and cyber—may be associated with both racial isolation and poverty concentration. Using student-level data from the universe of Pennsylvania public schools, this study builds upon previous research by specifically examining student transfers into charter schools, disaggregating findings by geography. We find that, on average, the transfers of African American and Latino students from TPSs to charter schools were segregative. White students transferring within urban areas transferred to more racially segregated schools. Students from all three racial groups attended urban charters with lower poverty concentration.
AhnJ. (2011). Policy, technology, and practice in cyber charter schools: Framing the issues. Teachers College Record, 113(1), 1-26.
2.
BakerB. D.FerrisR. (2011). Adding up the spending: Fiscal disparities and philanthropy among New York City charter schools. Boulder, CO. National Education Policy Center. Retrieved from http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/NYC-charter-disparities
3.
BalfanzR.LegtersN. E. (2004). Locating the dropout crisis: Which high schools produce the nation’s dropouts? In OrfieldG. (Ed.), Dropouts in America: Confronting the graduation rate crisis (pp. 57-84). Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.
4.
BellC. A. (2009). All choices created equal? The role of choice sets in the selection of schools. Peabody Journal of Education, 84, 191-208.
5.
BifulcoR.BulkleyK. E. (2008). Charter schools. In LaddH. F.FiskeE. B. (Eds.), Handbook of research in education finance and policy (pp. 425-446). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
6.
BifulcoR.LaddH. F. (2007). School choice, racial segregation, and test-score gaps: Evidence from North Carolina’s charter school program. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 26, 31-56.
7.
BischoffK. (2008). School district fragmentation and racial residential segregation: How do boundaries matter?Urban Affairs Review, 44, 182-217.
8.
BookerK.ZimmerR.BuddinR. (2005). The effects of charter schools on school peer composition. Santa Monica, CA: RAND.
9.
Brief of the American Psychological Association as Amicus Curiae in Support of Respondents, Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, et al. and Crystal D. Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education et al., (Nos. 05–908 & 05-915) (Sp. Ct. 2006).
10.
CarnoyM.JacobsenR.MishelL.RothsteinR. (2005). The charter school dust-up: Examining the evidence on enrollment and achievement. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
ChubbJ.MoeT. (1990). Politics, markets, and American schools. New York, NY: Brookings Institute Press.
15.
CowenJ. M.WintersM. A. (2013). Choosing charters: Who leaves public school as an alternative sector expands?Journal of Education Finance, 38, 210-229.
16.
DeeT.FuH. (2004). Do charter schools skim students or drain resources?Economics of Education Review, 23, 259-271.
17.
DeJarnattS. (2013, Fall). Keep following the money: Financial accountability and governance of cyber charter schools. Urban Lawyer, 45, 915-951.
18.
ErtasN. (2013). Charter schools and student composition of traditional public schools. SAGE Open., 3(2).
19.
FielJ. (2013). Decomposing school resegregation: Social closure, racial imbalance, and racial isolation. American Sociological Review, 78, 828-848.
20.
FinnC.MannoB.VanourekG. (2006). Charter schools in action: Renewing public education. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
21.
FinneganK.AdelmanN.AndersonL.CottonL.DonnellyM. B.PriceT. (2004). Evaluation of charter schools program: 2004 final report. U.S. Department of Education, Policy and Programs Study Service. Retrieved from http://www.ed.gov/rschstat/eval/choice/pcsp-final/index.html
22.
FrankenbergE. (2013). The role of residential segregation in contemporary school segregation. Education and Urban Society, 45(5), 548-570.
23.
FrankenbergE.FullerE.HartmanW.KotokS.MannB.SchafftK. A. (2014). Assessing the enrollment trends and financial impact of charter schools on rural and non-rural school districts. Harrisburgh, PA: Center for Rural Policy.
24.
FrankenbergE.LeeC. (2003). Charter schools and race: A lost opportunity for integrated education. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 11(32). Retrieved from http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/260
25.
FrankenbergE.Siegel-HawleyG.WangJ. (2011). Choice without equity: Charter school segregation. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 19(1). Retrieved from http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/779
26.
FullerB.ElmoreR. F.OrfieldG. (1996). Who chooses? Who loses? Culture, institutions, and the unequal effects of school choice. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
27.
GagneM.LyonsA. (2009). Memorandum on “creaming” the best students and pushing out the worst [Memorandum]. Chicago, IL: Chicago Public Schools.
28.
GarciaD. R. (2007). The impact of school choice on racial segregation in charter schools. Educational Policy22, 805-829.
29.
HeinleinL. M.ShinnM. (2000). School mobility and student achievement in an urban setting. Psychology in the Schools, 37, 349-357.
30.
HenigJ. (2008). Spin cycle: How research is used in policy debates: The case of charter schools. New York, NY: Routledge.
31.
HenigJ. R.MacDonaldJ. A. (2002). Locational decisions of charter schools: Probing the market metaphor. Social Science Quarterly, 83, 962-980.
32.
HodgeE. (2014, April). District consolidation, tracking, and educational equity: Lessons from the Woodland Hills School District. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Philadelphia, PA.
33.
HolmeJ. J. (2002). Buying homes, buying schools: School choice and the social construction of school quality. Harvard Educational Review, 72, 177-205.
HuertaL. A.GonzalezM.d’EntremontC. (2006). Cyber and home school charter schools: Adopting policy to new forms of public schooling. Peabody Journal of Education, 81(1), 103-139.
JacobsN. (2013). Understanding school choice: Location as a determinant of charter school racial, economic, and linguistic segregation. Education and Urban Society, 45, 459-482.
38.
KahlenbergR.PotterH. (2012). Diverse charter schools: Can racial and socioeconomic integration promote better outcomes for students. Washington, DC: Poverty and Race Research Council. Retrieved from http://www.tcf.org/assets/downloads/Diverse_Charter_Schools.pdf
39.
KirstM. (2007). Politics of charter schools: Competing national advocacy coalitions meet local politics. Peabody Journal of Education, 82, 184-203.
40.
KnightM. (2005). Cyber charter schools: An analysis of North Carolina’s current charter school legislation. North Carolina Journal of Law and Technology, 6, 395-435.
41.
KotokS.ReedK. (2015). Is opportunity knocking or slipping away: Pennsylvania’s increasing racial diversity and segregation in schools, 1989-2010. Los Angeles, CA: Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles.
LewisJ. H.HamiltonD. K. (2011). Race and regionalism: The structure of local government and racial disparity. Urban Affairs Review, 47, 349-384.
44.
LinnR. L.WelnerK. G. (Eds.). (2007). Race-conscious policies for assigning students to schools: Social science research and the Supreme Court cases. Washington, DC: National Academy of Education.
45.
LubienskiC. (2007). School competition and the emergence of symbolism in a market environment. In KaestleC. F.LodewickA. E. (Eds.), To educate a nation: Federal and national strategies of school reform (pp. 257-280). Lawrence: University Press of Kansas.
46.
LubienskiC.GulosinoC.WeitzelP. (2009). School choice and competitive incentives: Mapping the distribution of educational opportunities across local education markets. American Journal of Education, 115, 601-647.
47.
MasseyD.DentonD. N. (1988). The dimensions of residential segregation. Social Forces, 67, 281-315.
48.
MickelsonR. A. (2008). Twenty-first century social science on school racial diversity and educational outcomes. Ohio State Law Journal, 69, 1173-1228.
49.
MickelsonR. A.NkomoM. (2012). Integrated schooling, life-course outcomes, and social cohesion in multiethnic democratic societies. Review of Research in Education, 36, 197-238.
50.
MilbyE. C. (1996). Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission v. School District of Philadelphia: The Commonwealth Court revisits school desegregation, and decades of failure precipitates in a change of strategy. Widener Journal of Public Law, 5, 703-715.
51.
MironG.UrschelJ.MathisW.TornquistE. (2010). Schools without diversity: Education management organizations, charter schools, and the demographic stratification of the American school system. Education and the Public Interest Center/Education Policy Research Unit. Retrieved from http://epicpolicy.org/files/EMO-Seg.pdf
52.
MolnarA.RiceJ. K.HuertaL.ShaferS. R.BarbourM. K.MironG.. . .HorvitzB. (2014). Virtual schools in the U.S. 2014: Politics, performance, policy, and research evidence. Boulder, CO: National Education Policy Center. Retrieved from http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/virtual-schools-annual-2014
NelsonB.BermanP.EricsonJ.KamprathN.PerryR.SilvermanD.SolomonD. (2000). The state of charter schools 2000: Fourth-year report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement.
55.
NeumannR. (2008). Charter schools and innovation: The high tech high model. American Secondary Education, 36(3), 51-69.
56.
NiY. (2012). The sorting effect of charter schools on student composition in traditional public schools. Educational Policy, 26, 215-242.
57.
OrfieldG.FrankenbergE. (2013). Educational delusions? Why choice can deepen inequality and how to make it fair. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
58.
OrfieldG.FrankenbergE. (2014). Increasingly segregated and unequal schools as courts reverse policy. Educational Administration Quarterly, 50(6), 718-734.
59.
Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1, 551 U.S. 701 (2007).
ReardonS. F.GrewalE.KalogridesD.GreenbergE. (2012). Brown fades. The end of court ordered school desegregation and the resegregation of American public schools. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 31, 876-904.
63.
ReardonS. F.YunJ. T. (2005). Integrating neighborhoods, segregating schools: The retreat from school desegregation in the south, 1990-2000. In BogerJ. C.OrfieldG. (Eds.), School resegregation: Must the south turn back? (pp. 51-69). Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
64.
RenzulliL. A.EvansL. (2005). School choice, charter schools, and white flight. Social Problems, 52, 398-418.
RichardsM.StroubK. (2014). The fragmentation of metropolitan public school districts and the segregation of American schools: A longitudinal analysis. Teachers College Record, 116, 1-30.
67.
RitterG.JensenN.KisidaB.McGeeJ. (2010). A closer look at charter schools and segregation: Flawed comparisons lead to overstated conclusions. Education Next, 10(3), 69-73.
68.
RitterG.JensenN.KisidaB.McGeeJ. (2014). Urban school choice and integration the effect of charter schools in Little Rock. Education and Urban Society, 48(6), 535-555.
69.
RothsteinR. (2004). Class and schools: Using social, economic, and educational reform to close the black-white achievement gap. Washington, DC: Economic Policy Institute.
70.
RumbergerR. W.ThomasS. L. (2000). The distribution of dropout and turnover rates among urban and suburban high schools. Sociology of Education, 73(1), 39-67.
71.
SaporitoS.SohoniD. (2006). Mapping educational inequality: Concentrations of poverty among poor and minority students in public schools. Social Forces, 85, 1227-1253.
72.
ScottJ. (2009). The politics of venture philanthropy in charter school policy and advocacy. Educational Policy, 23, 106-136.
73.
ScottJ. (2012). A Rosa Parks moment? School choice and the marketization of civil rights. Critical Studies in Education, 54, 5-18.
74.
Siegel-HawleyG.FrankenbergE. (2011). Does law influence charter school diversity? An analysis of federal and state legislation. Michigan Journal of Race & Law, 16(2), 321-376.
75.
U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, & U.S. Department of Education, Office of Civil Rights. (2011). Guidance on the voluntary use of race to achieve diversity and avoid racial isolation in elementary and secondary schools. Retrieved from www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/docs/guidance-ese-201111.html
76.
ViterittiJ. P. (1999). Choosing equality: School choice, the constitution, and civil society. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.
77.
WatsonJ.PapeL.MurinA.GeminB.VashawL. (2014). Keeping pace with K-12 online learning: An annual review of policy and practice. Durango, CO: Evergreen Education Group.
78.
WeiherG. R.TedinK. L. (2002). Does choice lead to racially distinctive schools? Charter schools and household preferences. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 21, 79-92.
79.
WellsA. S.CrainR. L. (1994). Perpetuation theory and the long term effects of school desegregation. Review of Educational Research, 64, 531-555.
80.
WellsA. S.WarnerM.GrzesikowskiC. (2013). The story of meaningful school choice: Lessons from interdistrict transfer plans. In OrfieldG.FrankenbergE. (Eds.), Educational delusions? Why choice can deepen inequality and how to make schools fair (pp. 187-218). Berkeley: University of California Press.
81.
WelnerK. G.HoweK. R. (2005). Steering toward separation: The evidence and implications of special education students’ exclusion from choice schools. In ScottJ. (Ed.), School choice and diversity (pp. 93-111). New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
ZimmerR.BuddinR. (2006). Charter school performance in two large urban districts. Journal of Urban Economics, 60, 307-326.
84.
ZimmerR.GillB.BookerK.LavertuS.SassT. R.WitteJ. (2009). Charter schools in eight states: Effects on achievement, attainment, integration, and competition. Santa Monica, CA: RAND.
