New Flexibility, New Challenges? Federally Funded Magnet Schools Post–Parents Involved

• In Event: 66.039 - School Choice and Segregation: Evidence on Equity, Achievement, and Diversity

Abstract

In 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision in Parents Involved limiting the use of race in student assignment policies. The new legal restrictions prompted the federal government to amend regulations, providing greater flexibility to school districts designing MSAP programs for the 2010 grant competition. Specifically, in setting goals to reduce segregation districts were no longer required to use binary racial classifications (e.g., white/nonwhite) or prohibited from creating magnet schools that resulted in minority group enrollments exceeding the district-wide average. This paper explores how federal MSAP grantees in 2010 and 2013 applied the new regulation; specifically how minority group isolation (MGI) was defined and what strategies were used to reduce it in a changing legal environment.

Authors

• Genevieve Parker Siegel-Hawley, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Erica Frankenberg, The Pennsylvania State University

• Gary A. Orfield, University of California - Los Angeles

• Jenn Ayscue, University of California - Los Angeles

• Rachel Anne Levy, Virginia Commonwealth University

• Tara Vahdani, University of California - San Diego