School District Regionalization for Racial Balance Purposes: The Untold Story of Morristown, New Jersey

• In Event: Space and Place in Urban Educational Policy: Restructuring, Consolidation, and Gentrification

Abstract

School segregation levels continue to rise as school districts abandon court-ordered desegregation plans for locally controlled student assignment programs. If we want to create and sustain racially diverse public schools, we have to focus on policies and practices that work. One strategy, the “Morris School District (MSD) remedy,” involves the 1972 regionalization of the increasingly Black and more urban Morristown and the surrounding White suburban Morris Township. This research documents the successes and challenges of the consolidated district that emerged. Through in-depth interviews and focus groups with district, school and community respondents, we found that, while not perfect, MSD has been able to both attract and maintain a diverse student body and desegregated schools for over 40 years.

Authors

• Allison Roda, Rutgers University - Newark

• Paul L. Tractenberg, Rutgers University