"Their Hearts Are in the Right Place": School Segregation and Opportunity Hoarding in Brooklyn

• In Event: The Causes and Consequences of School and Neighborhood Segregation

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationship between local policy and individual action in the shaping of school segregation in New York City, through a close examination of one Brooklyn school district. It uses both historical and qualitative methods to examine how families’ choices and the district’s structures interact to produce unequal schooling, even in an environment in which a great deal of public attention has been directed at addressing educational inequality. The paper will make a unique contribution to the fields of educational policy and social history, and will inform national conversations about the relationship between social equality, educational opportunity, and the “hoarding” of relative advantage through the intersection of public policy and private choices.

Author

• Judith R. Kafka, Baruch College - CUNY