Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Research on the determinants of income-based segregation has focused on the potential role played by school choice. By separating school of enrollment from neighborhood of residence, public school choice policies could change how students are allocated to schools. One possibility is that higher income parents are more likely to use choice options, other things equal. If such parents use school characteristics like median family income or its correlates in deciding where to enroll their students, income-based segregation may be compounded. The most compelling work on this subject comes from researchers examining segregation within single districts after the introduction or expansion of charter schools. Bifulco, et al. (2009) find that the initiation of charter school policies results in more segregation by income and race than would be observed if no charter schools existed and all students attended their zoned public schools. Ladd et al. (2017) also find that there has been growing racial segregation between schools within the charter school sector in NC.

The research literature examining and explaining changes in socioeconomic segregation remains nascent, and many important empirical and policy questions remain. First, we know little about patterns of segregation within schools. In the project proposed here, we use detailed administrative data from North Carolina to answer the following questions to provide insight into within-school segregation:

• Has segregation of students by socioeconomic status increased within schools over the past decade?
• Is SES segregation within schools correlated with SES segregation within districts?