Outside the Comfort Zone: How Space and “Place” Influence the School Choice Patterns of Families

• In Event: Roundtable Session 124
  In Roundtable Session: How Parents Choose: Sociological and Economic Perspectives

Abstract

Using data collected during the 2008-2009 academic year from families in New York City’s mandatory public high school choice setting, this paper documents how families who might not otherwise have participated in choice understand their options within the realms of space and “place.” Initial findings indicate that the parents in this study “come to know” some schools “unruly places” (Reay, 2006, p.1193). Deep-rooted understandings of certain neighborhoods are social interpretations of “places” that are hard to deconstruct, and are powerful motivation for parents in the midst of the choice process. These psychological holdovers from the days of “zoned” or neighborhood schools are manifestations of social and political understandings of space and “place” which may be difficult to break through.

Author

• Sarah Butler Jessen, New York University