Socioeconomic-based School Assignment Policy and Racial Segregation Levels: Evidence from the Wake County Public School System

Citation:

D. Carlson, E. Bell, M. Lenard, J. Cowen, and A. McEachin. 2019. “Socioeconomic-based School Assignment Policy and Racial Segregation Levels: Evidence from the Wake County Public School System.” American Educational Research Journal, 57, 1, Pp. 258-304 . Publisher's Version

Abstract:

In the wake of legal challenges facing race-based integration, districts have turned tosocioeconomic integration in an attempt to achieve greater racial balance. Empirically, the extentto which these initiatives generate such balance is an open question. In this paper, we leveragethe school assignment system that the Wake County Public School System (WCPSS) employedto provide evidence on this issue. Although our results show that WCPSS’ socioeconomic-basedassignment policy had negligible effects on average levels of segregation across the district, itsubstantially reduced segregation for students who would have attended highly segregatedschools under a residence-based assignment policy. The policy also exposed these students topeers with different racial/ethnic backgrounds, higher achievement levels, and more advantagedneighborhood contexts.
Last updated on 09/16/2020