From Desegregation to Privatization: A Critical Race Theory Policy Analysis of School Choice and Educational Opportunity in North Carolina

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

Abstract

In this paper, we conduct an analysis of education laws and policies from the beginning of school desegregation to the current school choice and privatization reform efforts that show a cycle exists. We focus our analysis on North Carolina due to its well-known legal and political history of addressing school desegregation and its current support of various school choice options and privatizing public education. We conduct this analysis using a framework discussed in previous work useful in addressing cyclical inequalities, the convergence-divergence-reclamation cycle (or C-D-R cycle, pronounced “Cedar’), which extends from the work of Bell (1980) and Harris (1993). Findings suggest the ongoing battle over school choice and privatization is beginning to contradict the meaning of equal educational opportunity.

Authors

• Dana Thompson Dorsey, University of Pittsburgh

• Gwen D. Roulhac, Durham Public Schools