Eduwonk Blog Archive The Poor You Will Have Always With You? (Not in Some Public Schools)

Eduwonk  Blog Archive  The Poor You Will Have Always With You? (Not in Some Public Schools)

The Poor You Will Have Always With You? (Not in Some Public Schools)

A nifty new report from the Thomas B. Fordham Institute identifies some 2,800 public schools nationally that serve virtually no poor students. That’s a small percentage of schools nationally–but in some metro areas it means that as many as 1 in 4 white public school students attend schools with virtually no poor (and often few non-white) students.


This report is a valuable counterpoint to the recent debate over rates of racial segregation in charter schools–reminding us that in many metro areas, district-run schools are highly segregated and public policy choices systematically deny poor and minority kids opportunities to attend some of the highest performing “elite” district-run public schools in these areas.


The Fordham folks also deserve kudos for drawing attention to the extent that residential, zoning, and other non-education policies support or even exacerbate socio-economic residential segregation in ways that effectively keep “good” public schools in some neighborhoods entirely devoid of poor and minority students. As I noted yesterday, education policy debates