Parent Management of School Choice in a Large Urban District

Abstract

With No Child Left Behind legislation permitting students to switch from so-called failing schools, key questions are whether parents will act to select another school and which schools they will choose. Long-standing school choice systems provide evidence about low-income parents' strategies to gather information and negotiate the application process. Interviews with parents of eighth graders in Philadelphia indicate that faced with little high-quality official information about schools, parents' social networks played an important role in the decision. Most parents were hungry for information about schools but lacked specifics on academic performance or children's chances of admission. The data suggest that more detailed school information and a district commitment to counseling parents are essential for making well-informed choices. Even so, in districts with few good school options for students, there are limits to parents'ability to find a school that represents a substantial improvement over the school their child already attends.

Parental preferences in the choice for a specialty school

“…Our findings indicate that race and poverty levels are both powerful attractors. The parent behavior related to preferences for schools with high percentage of pupils who are of their own race observed in this study also reflects that found in other studies (Glazerman, 1998;Henig, 1990;Neild, 2005). It seems that parents' preferences expressed in the applications for specialty schools in Hillsborough County contribute to promoting segregation instead of helping to diminish it.…”

“…Similarly, in Philadelphia parents apply to schools where the theme fits their child's interests, is located near to home, and with similar racial composition (Neild, 2005).…”

School choice & social stratification: How intra-district transfers shift the racial/ethnic and economic composition of schools

“…Barriers to school choice participation typically include the following, both of which disproportionately burden low-income and minority families: access to transportation to and from school (Hastings et al, 2005), and access to information (both formal and informal) about the school choice processes and options (Bell, 2009;Goldring and Phillips, 2008;Holme, 2002;Mickelson and Southworth, 2005;Neild, 2005). Therefore, even if these families are motivated to seek out better schooling options for their children, their ability to do so is often constrained by conditions that are not fully addressed by unrestricted school choice policies.…”

Access to Better Education: The School Choice Experience of Families Served by Low-Performing Elementary Public Schools in Miami-Dade County

“…Formal networks refer to institutionalized resources for the acquisition of information such as websites, brochures, published school information and school personnel. Since the majority of parents use formal networks less often than they use informal networks, the quality of the information on which to base school choice decisions is not always high (Neild 2005;Goldring and Phillips 2008). However, Teske and his coauthors (2007) found that parents were able to make the right school choice match for their child with the limited quality information they had.…”

“…Only 36% of parents of non-transfers had at least a high school diploma. This is important because education influences a parent's socioeconomic status, which influences the likelihood of them using school choice options (Ball 1993;Neild 2005;Sikkink and Emerson 2008). Although the parents of transfers had one year more of education on average than that of non-transfers, they were less likely to be employed.…”