While suburban schools across the country have become increasingly racially and economically diverse in recent decades, many remain highly segregated. School attendance zone boundaries (AZBs) play a critical role in shaping these patterns of within-district segregation. AZBs are especially important in suburban areas with growing and diversifying…

Boundary lines have long served as a mechanism to divide people, determining the quality of available resources, and ultimately, educational opportunity. In recent years, new school district boundaries have proliferated as local communities attempt to secede from larger school districts. In this study of Memphis-Shelby County, Tennessee, we extend…

Suburbs across the US are experiencing dramatic demographic shifts, yet there is little research available on how suburban school districts are dealing with these changes. In this article, we examine the discourses surrounding race and demographic change in three suburban school districts that have been undergoing rapid demographic changes and…

This study focuses on how the demographic change occurring within two county-wide school districts and communities in the South, including the creation of suburban enclaves alongside central cities overwhelmingly made up of low-income students of color, influences community support for diversity policies within two school districts with a history…

In this qualitative case study, we explore the political impulses behind suburban secession from the 2013 Memphis-Shelby County merger, the largest school district consolidation in recent history. Decades removed from the Civil Rights Movement, during a period of stark inequality, colorblind law and policymaking, and a diminished understanding of…

The bulk of research on the implementation of school choice policies has focused on how choice has been implemented in urban school systems. As of 2007, however, suburban students comprised more than one fourth (29%) of all students engaging in some form of public school choice in the United States. This article examines the implementation of…

Purpose: This article examines factors that affect school board policy making about student diversity within two southern urban-suburban school districts experiencing changing demographics: Jefferson County Public Schools and the Wake County Public School System. Both districts have a history of voluntary integration efforts, and research shows…

As the demographic make-up of public schools (and neighborhoods) shift and schools become increasingly segregated, the role of school boards becomes critically important in maintaining policies designed to remedy segregation and promote equal opportunity, policies which may challenge the status quo. Specifically, in school districts and…

The demography of public school enrollment continues to change dramatically, with students of color comprising an increasing proportion of the whole. As such, suburbia, with both White and non-White students, is a place in which integration is more possible in the beginning of the 21st century. Due to the intertwined nature of how these factors…

Although demographic change is happening more rapidly at the elementary school level, the intersection of these demographic trends with the changing mission of high schools may offer the opportunity to reduce some of the persistent racial gaps in educational attainment. At the same time, when schools became diverse as desegregation took place,…

This manual was written to help guide education stakeholders--including parents, students, school board members, community activists, administrators, policymakers and attorneys--in their efforts to promote racial diversity and avoid racial isolation in suburban school systems. Critical information on the current legal, political and policy issues…

The political popularity of charter schools is unmistakable. This article explores the relationship between charter schools and segregation across the country, in 40 states, the District of Columbia, and several dozen metropolitan areas with large enrollments of charter school students in 2007-08. The descriptive analysis of the charter school…