The Association Between School Choice and District-Level Racial/Ethnic Achievement Disparities

• In Event: 28.061 - Charter School Policies and Their Impact on Stakeholders

Abstract

The rapid expansion of charter and magnet schools is restructuring public education in the United States. This study examines links between district-level charter and magnet school enrollment and race/ethnicity test score gaps using data from the Stanford Education Data Archive (Reardon et al., 2018) and the U.S. Department of Education’s Common Core of Data (2017). Results demonstrate that charter and magnet school enrollment are associated with larger white-black and white-Hispanic math gaps and charter school enrollment is also related to larger white-Hispanic English language arts gaps. This study provides important information about associations between district-level school choice expansion and racial/ethnic achievement disparities and lays groundwork for subsequent analysis considering pathways through which school choice exacerbates achievement gaps.

Authors

• Lorraine Blatt, University of Pittsburgh

• Elizabeth Votruba-Drzal, University of Pittsburgh