Burdens of Choice and Closure: Oral Histories of San Antonio Schooling

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Saturday 1:45 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Housing Instability: Roots, Redlining and Academic Disruption

Abstract

In 2024, Lamar Elementary, a school once celebrated for innovation and community partnership, was closed under district “rightsizing”, despite steady enrollment and academic gains. This paper argues that such closures reflect the afterlife of racialized property regimes, where access to education remains tethered to land value, zoning, and technocratic policy. Drawing on oral histories collected during the school closure debates, this paper centers families as everyday theorists whose narratives expose how school choice and closure shift structural burdens onto parents, teachers, and communities. Situating these stories within critical policy and discourse frameworks demonstrates how neoliberal reforms obscure harm while reinforcing inequality. This study challenges the myth of neutral reform and reveals how so-called educational “freedom” becomes a site of precarity.

Authors

• Habiba Noor, Trinity University

• Maria Aleman, Trinity University