Private Schools Play Role In Segregating K-12 Schools In South, Elsewhere; Segregation Increasing In N.C.

Friday, August 30, 2002

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DURHAM, N.C. -- Private schools have clearly played a role in the racial segregation of students in grades K-12 during the past 40 years, especially in the South, a new Duke University study shows.

A second study indicates an increase in segregation in all levels of North Carolina public schools between 1994-95 and 2000-01. It also raises concerns about between-school and within-school segregation -- segregation that occurs in different classrooms of the same school.

Both studies were conducted by faculty at Duke's Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy.

The studies, which have not been published, were presented at a conference Aug. 30 on "The Resegregation of Southern Schools? A Crucial Moment in the History (and the Future) of Public Schooling in America." The conference, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, was sponsored by the Center for Civil Rights at the UNC School of Law and the Civil Rights Project of Harvard University.

The study "Private Schools, Segregation, and the Southern States," was written by Charles T. Clotfelter, Z. Smith Reynolds professor of public policy studies and professor of economics and law. Clotfelter looked at private school enrollment since the advent of school desegregation, and the contribution of private schools to segregation, both in the South and elsewhere.

Among the study's key findings:

  •  Private schools have grown in the South since 1960, in contrast to their declining importance in the rest of the country. Contributing factors include the region's rising affluence and school desegregation.

  •  Private schools contributed to school segregation in 1999-2000, but they accounted for less than a fifth of all school segregation. More important factors were racial disparities between and within public school districts.

"The large size of [school] districts in the South meant that, when desegregation came, whites seeking to avoid its effects typically did not have the option so widely available in the North and West, to move to a predominantly white enclave. Thus private schools were the only alternative," the study noted.

Clotfelter, Helen F. Ladd, professor of public policy studies and economics; and Jacob L. Vigdor, assistant professor of public policy studies and economics, conducted the study "Segregation and Resegregation in North Carolina's Public School Classrooms," which was presented by Clotfelter at Friday's conference.

The researchers looked at data on students in the first, fourth, seventh and 10th grades from North Carolina's 117 public school districts using data from the N.C. Department of Public Instruction, made available through the N.C. Research Data Center. The center, housed in the Sanford Institute's Center for Child and Family Policy, is a collaboration between university researchers and the state of North Carolina that provides researchers with access to voluminous, confidential data on public schools, students and teachers.

The data allowed for a first-time examination of both between-school segregation and within-school segregation.

Among the key findings:

  •  A comparison for 1994-95 and 2000-01 shows a widespread trend toward increasing segregation in the state, with marked rises in Winston-Salem/Forsyth County and Charlotte-Mecklenburg school districts, among the larger districts.

  •  Segregation in schools is less severe than segregation in the state's residential neighborhoods.

  •  Segregation tends to be highest in school districts with non-white percentages between 50 percent and 70 percent.

  •  Within-school segregation differs markedly by grade level, with significantly higher levels of segregation in the seventh and 10th grades.

Several factors may explain within-school segregation, including administrative tracking and students' class choices. The net effect, said the researchers, is that middle and high school students are receiving less exposure to other races than between-school racial compositions would indicate. The school segregation numbers are "all the more striking in that they occurred during a period of decreasing residential segregation," the researchers noted.

The researchers do not know why overall segregation in North Carolina schools is increasing. Possible factors include the state's rapidly changing demographics, especially the significant increase in Hispanics, and the federal and state court systems' more lenient approach to school desegregation.

"Whether this change is a part of a permanent reversal of 40-year-old trends or merely a temporary blip is unclear at this time, but it is a trend worth continued scrutiny," the study concluded.

Vigdor said their ongoing research is aimed at better understanding these trends.

Both studies were funded, in part, by the Spencer Foundation of Chicago, which supports research designed to improve education around the world.

Editor's note: Charles Clotfelter can be reached for additional comment at (919) 613-7361; Helen Ladd, (919) 613-7352; Jacob Vigdor, (919) 613-7354. The papers may be viewed online at http://www.pubpol.duke.edu/faculty_workingpapers.html.