Residential Segregation
"If parents desire that their children attend neighborhood schools and if the nation's Constitution requires racially integrated schools, then neighborhoods must be integrated." -- Reynolds Farley
Much debate exists about the exact effect of residential segregation on school segregation. However, no one can dispute the fact that residential segregation and school segregation are heavily intertwined.
Over the past decades, whites have moved in flocks to the suburbs, leaving an increasingly heavier population of blacks in the cities and metropolitan. In 1990, more than 75% of African Americans in northern metropolitan areas and more than 65% in the southern metropolitan areas would have to move to be evenly distributed.
Nancy Denton, in her article "The Persistence of Segregation: Links Between Residential Segregation and School Segregation," create the term "hypersegregation" to describe the total segregation of residential areas on the basis of evenness of distribution, isolation, clustering, centralization, and concentration. She notes that residential trends have remained fairly constant over the decades.
While many view residential segregation as a natural part of the U.S. social structure, Denton argues that income differentials and voluntary segregation play the greatest roles in segregating housing areas. Income differentials, according to the most common estimates, can cause almost a third of segregation. Voluntary integration also plays a large role in residential segregation; blacks feel a sense of empowerment when living together and when able to keep the "black culture" alive, and whites like to remain to themselves. John Yinger says that residential segregation is an intimate part of what he calls the "discrimination system."
Statistically speaking, blacks and minorities have higher poverty rates than whites. As a result, the white flight movement has spread; i.e. an increasingly large number of the white population has fled to private schools, thus leaving inner-city, metropolitan schools with a higher population of black and minority students. Similarly, because of the socioeconomic divide between races, whites can typically afford to move into better school districts, once again leaving heavily populated areas of blacks in the worst school systems.
Finally, especially in Northern industrial areas, metropolitan fragmentation occurs; school district boundaries are frequently determined based upon suburban-city divisions. So, the city districts are heavily minority and black populated, whereas the suburb districts are predominantly white.
Over the past decades, whites have moved in flocks to the suburbs, leaving an increasingly heavier population of blacks in the cities and metropolitan. In 1990, more than 75% of African Americans in northern metropolitan areas and more than 65% in the southern metropolitan areas would have to move to be evenly distributed.
Nancy Denton, in her article "The Persistence of Segregation: Links Between Residential Segregation and School Segregation," create the term "hypersegregation" to describe the total segregation of residential areas on the basis of evenness of distribution, isolation, clustering, centralization, and concentration. She notes that residential trends have remained fairly constant over the decades.
While many view residential segregation as a natural part of the U.S. social structure, Denton argues that income differentials and voluntary segregation play the greatest roles in segregating housing areas. Income differentials, according to the most common estimates, can cause almost a third of segregation. Voluntary integration also plays a large role in residential segregation; blacks feel a sense of empowerment when living together and when able to keep the "black culture" alive, and whites like to remain to themselves. John Yinger says that residential segregation is an intimate part of what he calls the "discrimination system."
Statistically speaking, blacks and minorities have higher poverty rates than whites. As a result, the white flight movement has spread; i.e. an increasingly large number of the white population has fled to private schools, thus leaving inner-city, metropolitan schools with a higher population of black and minority students. Similarly, because of the socioeconomic divide between races, whites can typically afford to move into better school districts, once again leaving heavily populated areas of blacks in the worst school systems.
Finally, especially in Northern industrial areas, metropolitan fragmentation occurs; school district boundaries are frequently determined based upon suburban-city divisions. So, the city districts are heavily minority and black populated, whereas the suburb districts are predominantly white.
SOURCES
Denton, Nancy A. (1995-1996). "The Persistance of Segregation: Links Between Residential Segregation and School Segregation." Retrieved on December 3, 2012 from http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/mnlr80&div=32&id=&page=.
Denton, Nancy A. (1995-1996). "The Persistance of Segregation: Links Between Residential Segregation and School Segregation." Retrieved on December 3, 2012 from http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/mnlr80&div=32&id=&page=.