Shaping High School Choices: How Charter Schools Appeal to Particular Students

• In Event: 49.055 - Context Matters: How Social, Legal, and Professional Settings Affect Charter Schools and School Choice

Abstract

Research on school choice has developed sophisticated measures for understanding how families choose schools. Some of this research has examined the important role played by students, particularly in choice at the high school level. Yet, comparatively little research has focused on understanding how schools market and promote their unique curricular missions to students and their families. Building on previous research on school marketing at the elementary level, this study analyzes the websites of 47 upper-division charter schools in one metropolitan area. Drawing on a critical discourse analysis framework, we argue high schools selectively employ particular images and codes to appeal to students along lines of race, culture, class and gender, thus contributing to patterns of sorting and segregation between schools.

Authors

• Terri S. Wilson, University of Colorado Boulder

• Robert Carlsen, Southern Illinois University - Carbondale

• Joshua Rivera, Southern Illinois University - Carbondale