Boundaries and Thresholds: School Racial Composition and Teacher Resource Adequacy

• In Event: 523 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 12. School Context and Characteristics: Session III

Abstract

Racial segregation and racial inequities persist in United States public schooling. While racial gaps in achievement test scores and changes in segregation receive much attention, the relationship between racial segregation and educational resource inequities has been studied less systemically. Given the persistence of school racial segregation, how do we distribute goods and ills among spaces populated by different combinations of racial groups? I investigate the association between school racial composition and teacher resource adequacy in the United States from 1993 through 2011. I define teacher resource adequacy as the degree to which the number of teachers in a school is adequate given the economic resources and English-language abilities of the school’s students. Rather than relying on prior assumptions about the racial boundaries and compositional thresholds associated with privilege and deprivation, I compare the strength and significance of multiple models of both racial boundaries and compositional thresholds in accounting for resource distribution. Further, I describe the change and persistence of those patterns over time. My preliminary findings provide most support for a tri-racial, contextual model where “honorary Whites” generally enjoy access to the privileged resources available to Whites only when they share spaces with enough Whites and with few Blacks.

Author

• Jim Saliba, University of Minnesota