Recent civilrightsprojectucla items

Housing in the 21st Century: Taking Stock and Seeking Equality

Wed, 18 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Housing in the 21^st Century: Taking Stock and Seeking Equality provides an analysis of the current state of housing inequality in the United States, situating the discussion within the broader historical and social context. Over half a century after the Civil Rights Movement and the introduction of a suite of federal fair housing policies, stark racial inequalities persist in housing opportunities across the country. The study examines these inequalities and their underlying causes, and offers potential policy solutions.

Brown at 50: King's Dream or Plessy's Nightmare?

Thu, 15 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

This report examines a decade of resegregation from the time of theSupreme Court's 1991 "Dowell" decision, which authorized a return toneighborhood schools, even if that would create segregation, through the2001-2002 school year. It goes beyond previous reports by Harvard's CivilRights Project to study the impact of resegregation in districts whose wherecourt orders have been ended and includes new data on the presentsituation of the four communities involved in the first "Brown" decision a halfcentury ago as well as of a number of districts whose subsequent casesproduced decisive changes in the law of school desegregation. It alsoconsiders the very different desegregation levels in communities of differingsizes. Finally, it reviews the broad sweep of segregation changes nationally,regionally, and by state since the 1954 "Brown" decision. It shows that themovement that began with the Supreme Court decision has had an enduringimpact but that we are experiencing the largest backward...

California’s Demographic Future: Ethnic & Racial Change in the School-Age Population

Thu, 8 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The ethnoracial composition of California has seen decades of change mainly due to large waves of immigrants from Asia and Central and South America. While many states have experienced population decline, particularly among the youth and working-age populations, California has grown. However, small changes have begun to occur within the state, including smaller migration flows and falling birth rates. Population changes among school-age children have significant policy implications for a multitude of community institutions, including education, healthcare, and community planning. What should schools and educators across California expect over the coming decades? How is the school-age population (ages 5-18) expected to change with respect to its ethnoracial composition, generational status, home language, and educational attainment? Employing an innovative microsimulation model, we project a small increase in the number of California’s school-age children in 2050 and very little...

U.S. Economic Vitality Depends on Immigration

Thu, 8 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The paper, “U.S. Economic Vitality Depends on Immigration,” presents a detailed analysis of population growth trends and potential impacts on labor-market projections, with particular emphasis on immigrant workers. The research examines long-term population projections, considering total fertility rates by race in the U.S. and total immigration among different racial groups, and estimates the immigration growth rate needed to stabilize the U.S. population in the long term. The research also examines labor market needs for workers, details the educational attainment of immigrants, and highlights their education and training needs. The report provides policy recommendations that encourage and prepare immigrants already in the U.S. to participate in the workforce and incentivize and support new immigration.

Disabling Inequity: The Urgent Need for Race-Conscious Resource Remedies

Tue, 23 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Among the most critical pre-pandemic inequities that have not received sufficient attention is the fact that many districts are not meeting their legal and moral obligation to educate students with disabilities, which must include providing needed mental health services, behavioral supports and educationally sound interventions by well qualified staff. This report reveals serious pre-existing conditions of inadequate support that are likely to be exacerbated by the current pandemic, summarizes the pandemic’s disparate impact, which is resulting in greater losses of instructional time amidst increasing experiences of trauma, and argues for additional post-pandemic steps to ensure that all students with disabilities needing supports and services must receive a free appropriate public education (FAPE) to have those needs met, and that they are not excluded because of behaviors caused by their disability.

Investing in Our Nation’s Future: Advancing Educational Opportunity for Underserved Students

Thu, 4 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The United States is undergoing a profound demographic transformation, with individuals from racial/ethnic minority backgrounds becoming a growing majority among school age youth, adults, and overall. This shift presents both a critical opportunity and an urgent need to address persistent educational inequities that shape aggregate national outcomes. This report draws on human capital theory and benefit-cost analyses to examine the large public returns of advancing an equity-focused educational agenda that improves investments in historically underserved populations. The evidence shows that interventions such as high-quality early childhood education, high school completion initiatives, and comprehensive school supports generate significant public benefits, with benefit-cost ratios ranging from $2 to over $12 for every dollar invested. Simulations suggest that narrowing racial/ethnic educational opportunity and outcome gaps could yield between $20 billion to over $70 billion annual...

Preserving Integration Options for Latino Children: A Manual for Educators, Civil Rights Leaders, and the Community

Thu, 6 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

This document will explain the effects of the Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District No. 1 and Meredith v. Jefferson County Board of Education (cases known as PICS) ruling and how school board members can continue to use lawful policies, like those outlined by Justice Kennedy in the PICS opinion, to further the important goals of decreasing racial isolation, promoting diversity, and furthering equal educational opportunity in our public schools.

Extreme Segregation and Policy Inaction in California Schools

Thu, 11 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

California is under an illusion that it’s a progressive place where racial diversity is a strength, yet it operates the nation’s most segregated schools, according to this report’s analysis. Segregation has quadrupled in CA schools in the last 30 years. Schools are segregated not just by race – there is double segregation by race and poverty, which means systematically unequal educational opportunity for students of color.

Academic Disparities in California’s Central and Imperial Valleys

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

California, known for having the largest economy in the United States, faces significant educational inequities. This report focuses on the racial and ethnic academic disparities in California’s Central and Imperial Valleys (CIV). Despite California’s overall economic strength, the CIV remains a pocket of severe socio-economic hardship, with marked disparities in educational outcomes that have persisted over time. Using a decade’s worth of data on K-12 students, we examine standardized test scores in mathematics and English language arts (ELA), absenteeism, and graduation rates while controlling for student-level demographics and school district characteristics. We find persistent achievement gaps between racial/ethnic groups in standardized test scores, absenteeism, and graduation rates despite efforts to address these disparities through state policies and funding. The findings in this report underscore the pressing need for targeted policies and interventions to address these...

The Case for a Right to a Racially Just Education

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

California’s statewide system for public education is designed to serve a minority of its students very well, and the rest, not well at all. The “haves”—students with access to necessary educational supports—thrive, while the “have nots”—students who lack these resources due to no fault of their own—lag behind. Black, Indigenous, Latino, Pacific Islander students, immigrant children, foster youth, unhoused students, students with disabilities, and English learners are consistently underserved by our schools. Over the past 30 years, much attention has been directed at the persistence of the discredited “achievement gap,” which subtly (and not so subtly) has placed the responsibility for “not achieving” on students, their families, and their communities. Today, formally conceptualized as an “opportunity gap,” this reclassification still fails to assign responsibility where it belongs: on the State’s failure to establish a public education system that ensures (not just aspires to)...

The Vast, Rich, Profoundly Unequal Megalopolis Called LASANTI: Can Leaders Take the Southern California-Baja Region to its Next Stage? (Policy Paper)

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The more than 24 million people who live in urbanized Southern California and metropolitan Tijuana share one of the largest and most productive spaces on earth. The Civil Rights Project calls this region LASANTI,1 more than 200 miles of continuous urbanization in what has become a great coastal megalopolis, a place of powerful contact between two large and important countries which share a great deal but are divided by walls, politics and language. The endless streams of cars and trucks crossing the border in both directions reflect the needs and complementary economies of the two nations. LASANTI by itself is now the 11th largest economy in the world and critically important to the economies of California, the U.S. and Mexico. We are each other’s most important trading partner and we are interdependent in many ways. We are at a cusp of large changes that could be transformative if there were strong leadership.

Meeting its Potential: A Call and Guide for Universal Access to Bilingual Education in California

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

California’s cultural and linguistic diversity are remarkable assets for the state. In particular, bilingualism is linked not only to economic growth, but also to improved health, social empathy, educational attainment, community cohesion, and civic engagement. Harnessing this potential depends upon the educational success of California’s more than one million students classified in K-12 schools as English learners (ELs). Abundant evidence illuminates not only the potential of this talented group of students, but also the danger of them being relegated to a second-class status in school. After nearly twenty years of English-only education, California has made significant strides in growing bilingual education programs, programs such as dual language immersion, maintenance bilingual, and heritage language revitalization, and in doing so has recognized bilingual education’s potential to improve academic and post-schooling outcomes for all students. State initiatives including Global...

California’s Geography of Opportunity: Intergenerational Mobility in the Golden State

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In anticipation of the next twenty-five years of civil rights policy in California, this work investigates social mobility in the Golden State between the last two generations to gain insight into which groups could be best served by civil rights policy interventions (the first aim of the paper). This study used a publicly accessible database created by Opportunity Insights which employed data from the U.S. Census Bureau and Internal Revenue Service (Chetty, Hendren, Kline, & Saez, 2014; Chetty, Hendren, Kline, Saez, & Turner, 2014) to geospatially analyze the social mobility of children born in the Golden State relative to their parents. Furthermore, this study leverages a complementary dataset from IPUMS USA (Ruggles, 2019) to provide evidence that Hispanic and Asian mobility is likely mischaracterized in California when non-legal permanent residents (non-LPR) are excluded.

From Institutions to Individuals: A Paradigm Shift for California's Master Plan for Higher Education

Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

A new Master Plan for Higher Education is long overdue. California’s landmark 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education served its time well, but a new plan is needed to better serve today’s diverse and economically varied student population. The original plan sought to balance access to higher education with efficient use of state resources by formally articulating the tripartite system of the University of California (UC), California State University (CSU), and California Community Colleges (CCC) and establishing a coordinating body. However, this once forward-thinking plan now helps perpetuate inequities and California’s inconsistent adherence to the plan has exacerbated its waning usefulness. California urgently needs a new master plan to sustain and strengthen California’s economic vitality and this essay outlines a new direction for a new student-centered master plan that eliminates artificial barriers and promotes equitable access and inclusive success. This new Master Plan...

Segregated by Teacher Experience in California

Fri, 10 May 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Given the importance of teacher experience and possible changes to the racial distribution of experience in recent years, this policy brief examines the distribution of teacher experience across segregated schools in California. The authors analyzed 7 years of the most recent publicly available data from California’s public schools, focusing on the relationship between student race and teacher experience.

Barriers to Racial Equity for Teachers of Color and Indigenous Teachers in California’s Teaching Pipeline and Profession

Fri, 10 May 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This paper explores obstacles to recruiting and retaining teachers of color and Indigenous teachers (TOCIT) in California’s schools. The researchers used a mix of qualitative and quantitative data collected over the course of one year from system leaders in teacher preparation, pre-service teachers, in-service teachers, and former teachers to better understand current policies and practices that may be contributing to teacher burnout, turnover and early retirement.

Can Our Schools Capture the Educational Gains of Diversity? North Carolina School Segregation, Alternatives and Possible Gains

Tue, 30 Apr 2024 00:00:00 +0000

May 17, 2024 marks the 70^th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, the landmark Supreme Court decision that ruled segregated schools were “inherently unequal.” At the time, North Carolina was one of 17 states that enforced de jure segregation, that is, segregation by law. The state of North Carolina and the school districts within the state have played prominent roles in our nation’s history of school desegregation. North Carolina’s public school enrollment is increasingly multiracial, and the expansion of school choice means that a growing share of students attends charters and private schools, both of which tend to be more segregated than traditional public schools. As the nation marks this important anniversary, the authors assess where North Carolina schools are now in terms of school desegregation, as segregated schools are systematically linked to unequal educational opportunities and outcomes, while desegregated schools are associated with...

Segregated Choices: Magnet and Charter Schools

Fri, 12 Apr 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This analysis describes levels of diversity in a comparable subset of schools to enable policy-relevant comparisons between charter and magnet schools. We examine schools in districts that had at least five charter schools and five magnet schools in any year since 2000. This selection includes most of the 100 largest school districts since both types of schools developed mostly in large urban districts. This sample is especially relevant to choice policies because it allows comparisons in the same districts where both types of school choice have been tried at a significant level. This study describes the level of segregation in recent decades in large districts which had a significant presence of schools of both types.

The Unfinished Battle for Integration in a Multiracial America – from Brown to Now

Mon, 8 Apr 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Brown v. Board of Education was a turning point in American law and race relations. In a country where segregated education was the law in seventeen states with completely separate and unequal schools, Brown found that segregation was “inherently unequal” and violated the Constitution. This report discusses the present realities of school segregation and the patterns of change over 70 years.

Developmental Education Reform as a Civil Rights Agenda: Recent History & Future Directions for California

Wed, 27 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In this paper, the authors describe the research that prompted developmental education reform approaches nationally and in California, describe the efforts in California that led to the passing of AB705 by the California state legislature, and summarize research on its implementation and outcomes. We explore the implications of this research for improving postsecondary access and success for Black and Hispanic students and English learners.

Understanding Suburban School Segregation: Toward a Renewed Civil Rights Agenda

Fri, 1 Mar 2024 00:00:00 +0000

As shifting populations change suburban school enrollment, education policy trends formerly confined to urban districts have spread to suburban ones. Many suburban school districts have experienced growth in the charter school sector, as well as a rash of school closures. Suburban schools and districts reflect broader societal problems, paradigms, and possibilities. Yet, if our society is to advance equitable opportunity for all, children learning together in suburban schools must be part of the solution. In order to think clearly about what a renewed civil rights agenda entails given our complex and multiracial geography of inequality, we must understand the extent to which suburban school districts are segregated—and why. We also need to think deeply about policy responses to advance integration with equitable status for all children. This paper draws on federal enrollment data from the nation’s largest 25 metros from 2011-2020 to descriptively analyze suburban school enrollment...

Update to Lost Instruction Time in California Schools

Tue, 16 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Many educators in California are unaware of just how harmful out of school suspensions can be. When suspended students are barred from attending school, more often than not, the rule broken was some form of minor misconduct. This update of "Lost Instruction Time in California Schools" demonstrates that despite the important efforts by the state of California to reduce suspensions, those efforts are seriously insufficient.

Washington, D.C.'s Voucher Program: Civil Rights Implications (working paper)

Tue, 16 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The District of Columbia has the nation’s only school voucher program established and funded by the federal government. In thinking about the federal initiative in an arena that is a top priority of the Trump Administration it is well to assess this effort over the last 15 years. Clearly the advocates had very high hopes that it would be a major solution to the weak educational results for children in schools that were overwhelmingly poor and nonwhite. Unlike most of the voucher programs, this one mandated evaluations but the results of the evaluations the federal government has commissioned have been seriously disappointing. This paper examines the goals of the program, the hopes of its authors and supporters, and the skeptical predictions of its opponents, and what actually happened.

Seizing the Opportunity to Narrow the Achievement Gap for English Learners: Research-based Recommendations for the Use of LCFF Funds

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Seizing the Opportunity to Narrow the Achievement Gap for English Learners: Research-based Recommendations for the Use of LCFF Funds

Charters as a Driver of Resegregation

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Building upon existing research that finds charter schools tend to be more segregated than traditional public schools, this report describes how charter schools also contribute to resegregation in traditional public schools. The authors explore the direct and indirect ways in which this occurs through a case study of Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS) in North Carolina.

Segregating California’s Future: Inequality and its Alternative 60 Years after Brown v. Board of Education

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Marking the 60th anniversary of the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision Brown v Board of Education, CRP researchers assessed California's progress in addressing school segregation, and found that California students are more racially segregated than ever. The authors conclude that California is the third worst state when it comes to school segregation for African Americans, behind New York and Illinois. California is, however, the state in which Latino students are most segregated.

Building Pathways to Transfer: Community Colleges that Break the Chain of Failure for Students of Color

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In this study, we set out to ask: (1) What causes some students to choose higher transfer community colleges than the college most students from their high school attend? (2) What do these higher transfer colleges do to effect better outcomes for students of color coming from these high need/low-performing high schools? Five colleges were identified as disproportionately transferring students of color from low performing/high needs high schools to community colleges. Three colleges were disproportionately successful with Latino students, and two colleges with African American students, but none was equally successful with both groups. Two colleges were located in urban centers (both of these were most successful with African Americans), two in urban-suburban areas, and one in a rural area of the state. The colleges ranged in size from relatively small (9500) to large (32,000). Each campus had its own success story, and some probably would not qualify today...

Gentrification and Schools: Challenges, Opportunities and Policy Options

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The study examines the growth of gentrification in California and its impact on schools and educational opportunities in the state. The study highlights the complex connections between gentrification, school choice, and school segregation patterns, finding the relationship between gentrification and local elementary schools largely depends on the specific city and community being gentrified. Statewide, gentrified neighborhoods have become more racially and economically diverse compared to those that did not gentrify, but the analysis finds only modest changes in local schools.

Nationwide Survey of State Education Agencies’ Online School Disciplinary Data

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

UCLA Civil Rights Project’s Center for Civil Rights Remedies has collaborated with the Council of State Governments Justice Center (CSG Justice Center) to extract information from all 50 State Education Agency (SEA) websites and Washington, DC to compile publicly-reported school disciplinary data below. The findings are shown in the downloadable spreadsheet with summaries of student disciplinary data for each state. Information in the table was corroborated by SEA staff. Although most states offer additional data on disciplinary actions upon request, this web-based tool only uses data readily available to the public online.

The Potential of California's Community College Baccalaureate for Closing Racial Equity Gaps

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The bachelor’s degree remains a fundamental path to economic opportunity in the United States. Critical for policymakers, then, is ensuring equitable access to such benefits–a task often constrained by long-standing structural barriers. One of the most obvious structural impediments for bachelor’s degree-aspirants in California (CA) is the current version of the CA Master Plan for Higher Education. With a robust public higher education system that is continually forced to adapt to demographic shifts and evolving labor markets, California is an especially important region for exploring the future of postsecondary education and economic growth. This report describes what we currently know about the California Community College Baccalaureate (CCB) program that was launched in 2017 and expanded in 2021. The program shows promising outcomes and that state education leaders can leverage existing components of the state’s education ecosystem to meet the economic and social demands of...

Nationwide Survey of State Education Agencies’ Online School Disciplinary Data for Students with Disabilities

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

UCLA Civil Rights Project’s Center for Civil Rights Remedies has extracted information from all 50 State Education Agency (SEA) websites and Washington, DC to compile publicly-reported school disciplinary data below. The findings are shown in the downloadable spreadsheet with summaries of student disciplinary data for each state. Information in the table was corroborated by SEA staff. Although most states offer additional data on disciplinary actions upon request, this web-based tool only uses data readily available to the public online.

Private School Vouchers: Legal Challenges and Civil Rights Protections (working paper)

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In this report, the authors detail the evolution of voucher policies, from their roots in the Jim Crow Era to their modern-day applications, including the rise of “neovoucher” programs; the past legal challenges to vouchers; factors that may influence the legal justifications of vouchers, including the quality of education for students of color in voucher programs; key policy issues that arise from this shift toward greater public funding of private schools; and conclude with a set of recommendations focused on civil rights protections.

Brown at 60: Great Progress, a Long Retreat and an Uncertain Future

Wed, 3 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Brown at 60: Great Progress, a Long Retreat and an Uncertain Future

The Impact of a Broken Immigration System on U.S. Students and Schools

Tue, 5 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This new collaborative research brief updates and builds on a previous analysis of a 2017-18 survey examining the harmful impacts of immigration enforcement on Latinx children of undocumented immigrants. This research brief summarizes key findings from “Schools Under Siege: The Impact of Immigration Enforcement on Educational Equity” (Gándara and Ee, 2021) but updates the analysis with more recent data.

American Indian and Alaska Native Populations: Envisioning the Future

Mon, 4 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Historically-based structural disadvantages impinge on AIAN people’s civil rights, and redressing these issues requires plausible information about the future size, age structure, and locational distribution of the population. AIAN people and Tribal Nations are also subject to statistical racism, in which their data (and thus their successes and needs) are ignored because they are relatively small populations. This report presents population projections of the racially-identified American Indian and Alaska Native population from the present to 2050 using a traditional demographic method that has been modified to account for net response change – one of the most significant data-related challenges.

The Changing Racial and Ethnic Composition of the School-Age Population in the U.S.

Mon, 4 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This research projects the racial and ethnic composition of the U.S. population over the next 3 decades, and finds that it is rapidly changing in response to decades of sustained large-scale immigration.

Lost Instruction Time in California Schools: The Disparate Harm from Post-Pandemic Punitive Suspensions

Tue, 31 Oct 2023 00:00:00 +0000

What we don’t know about school discipline and discipline disparities may be hurting the very students who most need a stable school life. The consequences of a suspension can be grave for any child, but the potential for causing extreme harm to foster and homeless youth is rarely considered by educators who punish these children by removing them from school. The uncertain living circumstances for these children are further destabilized when educators deny them access to school for breaking a school rule. The data on lost instruction due to out-of-school suspensions (OSSs) show that students with precarious living situations—foster and homeless youth of all racial/ ethnic groups—are punished far more than most other groups. This report provides a detailed review of how suspensions directly contribute to disparities in learning opportunities for students in these two groups, and along the lines of race and disability in every California school district.

Racial Reckoning and the Role of Schooling: Exploring the Potential of Integrated Classrooms and Liberatory Pedagogies

Thu, 28 Sep 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Schools have long existed as a means of maintaining democracy in the United States and, given the centrality of race relations to the success of democracy, this paper suggests that schools can be called upon to address racism as well. As such, this paper looks to our rapidly diversifying nation and asks: “What would it take to move closer to meaningfully addressing the legacy of racism in the United States, and what role might schools play in this process?”

Discrimination in the 21st Century: How Civil Rights Policies Can Best Embrace the Growing Mixed-Race Population

Thu, 31 Aug 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This report catalogues the growth of the modern mixed-race population in the United States and highlights the many complications this population presents for the future of civil rights law and policy. What is most distinctive of today’s mixed-race individuals is their assertion of a mixed-race identity which they claim embodies a different experience compared to those who report to be a single race such as “white” or “black.” This emphasis on personal identity presents a new dimension that must be considered in the development of new civil rights policy.

Bilingual Education and America's Future: Evidence and Pathways

Tue, 27 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

As the population of students classified as English learners (EL) grows and EL-classified students continue to experience barriers to opportunity, the need to improve services and supports for EL-classified students becomes increasingly urgent. In this piece we advocate that the next twenty-five years of education and social policymaking should include establishing, through federal policy, bilingual education as the standard service for EL-classified students. Our argument is based in a rigorous, comprehensive synthesis of evidence for the benefits of bilingual education, bilingualism, and biliteracy for students and the nation, a supportive sociopolitical moment, and a wealth of resources and knowledge to support implementation. We also make the case for a series of incremental federal, state, and local policy actions to build towards bilingual education as the standard for EL-classified students. We outline these actions as well as key considerations to guide the incremental...

The Role of Standardized Tests in College Admissions

Fri, 9 Jun 2023 00:00:00 +0000

This paper summarizes the history of college admissions testing in the United States; how the SAT and ACT are used today in admissions; admissions criteria and their use; the future of admissions tests and alternative approaches to admissions. It also provides thoughts on the definition of "merit" and the value of meritocracy in college admissions.

Unmasking School Discipline Disparities in California: What the 2019-2020 Data Can Tell Us About Problems and Progress

Tue, 2 Aug 2022 00:00:00 +0000

We hope this report will help to renew attention to the problem of excessive discipline. In keeping with this aim, we compare the projected full-year suspension rate for 2019-2020 to rates from prior years. We provide these projected suspension rates for the overall student population in California, and for every racial/ethnic subgroup at the state and district levels. We encourage education policymakers at the state and district levels to use the projections we provide in this report to distinguish districts that were on the path toward lower suspension rates from those on a path toward an increase or that showed no change.

School Integration in Gentrifying Neighborhoods: Evidence from New York City

Tue, 7 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

gentrification, demographic change, school demographics, school integration

Dallas Diversity and Inclusion Study

Tue, 10 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Dallas, one of the nation’s largest central cities in its most rapidly growing metropolitan areas, has had a shrinking school district in the midst of major housing development. A surge in housing costs since the Great Recession has led to the return of middle class and white families to a number of communities but that has not been reflected in the student population. In response to the challenge of closing more schools and losing out to expanding charters, the DISD leadership decided to create some new schools and restart some older ones with programs designed both to attract new and non-public school families and to offer new choices to the families of color and low income families already in the system. This commitment to quality and diversity is still relatively modest but could hold real promise for both the city’s schools and as a national example of creative leadership. Because of our long-term interest in integration and quality schooling for all students we decided to...

NYC School Segregation Report Card: Still Last, Action Needed Now!

Thu, 10 Jun 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Eight years ago, in 2014, The Civil Rights Project issued a report that raised awareness about the dire state of segregation in New York State and, in particular, New York City schools. That report spurred substantial activism, primarily led by student groups, parents, teachers, and administrators, which has been influential in the current integration efforts underway in NYC. This report serves as an update to the 2014 report, which analyzed data up to 2010. The analysis of recent data in this report reveals trends from 2010-2018 in school segregation at the state, city, borough, and community district level.

Black Segregation Matters: School Resegregation and Black Educational Opportunity

Tue, 23 Feb 2021 00:00:00 +0000

This report shows that the segregation of Black students has increased in almost every region of the nation, and that Black students in many of nation’s largest school districts have little access to or interaction with White, Asian or middle-class students. The report documents substantial Black enrollment in suburban schools, but high levels of segregation in them. Several of the nation’s largest states, including California, New York and Texas, are among the nation’s most segregated in terms of exposure of Black students to their White counterparts. The study details how the national student population is changing and examines the basic patterns of enrollment, segregation and integration across the U.S. The analysis includes enrollment and segregation trends for the past several decades, nationally, by region, community type, and poverty level, and showing the most and least segregated states along multiple measures.

Scholarly Findings on Affirmative Action Bans

Tue, 17 Nov 2020 00:00:00 +0000

This policy brief provides an overview of what is known about the impact of these bans nationally and complements research specific to California (see, for example, Kidder 2020). It includes: admission of highly qualified applicants, racial and ethnic diversity in higher education at highly selective and less selective institutions, ethnic and racial diversity in graduate fields of study, STEM degrees, faculty diversity, and the way that colleges and universities have attempted to compensate for the absence of affirmative action.

Proposition 16 and a Brighter Future for All Californians: A synthesis of research on affirmative action, enrollment, educational attainment and careers at the University of California

Tue, 17 Nov 2020 00:00:00 +0000

This policy brief synthesizes research on enrollment, graduation and career success for traditionally underrepresented students, the benefits of diverse learning environments including campus racial climate, and the need to increase diversity in UC professional and graduate schools to better serve the health and wellbeing of all Californians.

Policy Brief: Unequal Public Schools Makes Affirmative Action Essential for Equal Opportunity

Tue, 17 Nov 2020 00:00:00 +0000

The brief first presents new facts on the extraordinary segregation of Black and Latino students in the state’s public schools. Second, it shows that those groups are doubly segregated by race and poverty at the most educationally unsuccessful schools. These children are, on average, from families with far lower income and wealth and with parents with significantly less education. School is their chance to break the cycle of inequality but they are highly isolated in the state’s weakest schools, with very few having the opportunity to attend the competitive schools which are the most equipped to prepare students for access to a very competitive higher education system. The playing field is highly unequal — so many of the advantages that come to students from more privileged families do not reflect individual skill or merit in winning the race, but a much better starting point within the unequal public schools. Extreme segregation in unequal schools means that Black and Latino...

Lost Opportunities: How Disparate School Discipline Continues to Drive Differences in the Opportunity to Learn

Thu, 15 Oct 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Lost Opportunities: How Disparate School Discipline Continues to Drive Differences in the Opportunity to Learn

Is California Doing Enough to Close the School Discipline Gap?

Mon, 20 Jul 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Is California Doing Enough to Close the School Discipline Gap?

The Striking Outlier: The Persistent, Painful and Problematic Practice of Corporal Punishment in Schools

Wed, 10 Jul 2019 00:00:00 +0000

This report examines only the data (students populations and paddling incidents) from schools where corporal punishment is used. The report relies on data from the U.S. Department of Education's Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC), primarily from the 2013-14 school year. In schools where corporal punishment is practiced, black students and students with disabilities are more likely to be struck than white students and those without disabilities.

The Unequal Impact of Suspension on the Opportunity to Learn in CA

Wed, 10 Jul 2019 00:00:00 +0000

In 2016-17, schoolchildren in California lost an estimated 763,690 days of instruction time, a figure based on the combined total of 381,845 in-school suspensions (ISS) and out-of-school suspensions (OSS). This is an updated report on CA suspension practice.

Private Schools in American Education: A Small Sector Still Lagging in Diversity (working paper)

Mon, 13 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Private Schools in American Education: A Small Sector Still Lagging in Diversity (working paper)

Harming Our Common Future: America's Segregated Schools 65 Years aFter Brown

Mon, 13 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Harming Our Common Future: America's Segregated Schools 65 Years aFter Brown

When Families Are Deported: Schooling for US-Citizen Students in Mexico

Mon, 26 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

When Families Are Deported: Schooling for US-Citizen Students in Mexico

U.S. Immigration Enforcement Policy and Its Impact on Teaching and Learning in the Nation's Schools

Mon, 26 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

U.S. Immigration Enforcement Policy and Its Impact on Teaching and Learning in the Nation's Schools

Stressed, Overworked, and Not Sure Whom to Trust: The Impacts of Recent Immigration Enforcement on our Public School Educators

Mon, 26 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Stressed, Overworked, and Not Sure Whom to Trust: The Impacts of Recent Immigration Enforcement on our Public School Educators

Minority Serving Institutions under Trump’s presidency: Considerations for current policies and future actions

Thu, 1 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Minority Serving Institutions under Trump’s presidency: Considerations for current policies and future actions

In Consideration of Reinstating Pell for Incarcerated Students

Thu, 1 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

In Consideration of Reinstating Pell for Incarcerated Students

How accountability can increase racial inequality: The case of federal risk-sharing

Thu, 1 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

How accountability can increase racial inequality: The case of federal risk-sharing

Asian Americans and Race-Conscious Admissions: Understanding the Conservative Opposition’s Strategy of Misinformation, Intimidation & Racial Division

Thu, 1 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Asian Americans and Race-Conscious Admissions: Understanding the Conservative Opposition’s Strategy of Misinformation, Intimidation & Racial Division

The Impact of the PROSPER Act on Underrepresented Students in For-profit Colleges

Thu, 1 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

The Impact of the PROSPER Act on Underrepresented Students in For-profit Colleges

Teachers of English Language Learners in Secondary Schools: Gaps in Preparation and Support

Thu, 8 Feb 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Teachers of English Language Learners in Secondary Schools: Gaps in Preparation and Support

White Growth, Persistent Segregation: Could Gentrification Become Integration?

Mon, 22 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

White Growth, Persistent Segregation: Could Gentrification Become Integration?

New Jersey's Segregated Schools: Trends and Paths Forward

Sun, 19 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

New Jersey's Segregated Schools: Trends and Paths Forward

Lost Instruction: The Disparate Impact of the School Discipline Gap in California

Thu, 2 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Lost Instruction: The Disparate Impact of the School Discipline Gap in California

Deepening Segregation in American Public Schools: A Special Report from the Harvard Project on School Desegregation

Thu, 2 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Deepening Segregation in American Public Schools: A Special Report from the Harvard Project on School Desegregation

The Baccalaureate in the California Community College: Current Challenges & Future Prospects

Mon, 23 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

The Baccalaureate in the California Community College: Current Challenges & Future Prospects

Alternative Paths to Diversity: Exploring and Implementing Effective College Admissions Policies

Mon, 23 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Alternative Paths to Diversity: Exploring and Implementing Effective College Admissions Policies

Tough Choices Facing Florida's Governments: Patterns of Resegregation in Florida's Schools

Mon, 23 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Tough Choices Facing Florida's Governments: Patterns of Resegregation in Florida's Schools

Choices Worth Making: Creating, Sustaining and Expanding Diverse Magnet Schools

Wed, 31 May 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Choices Worth Making: Creating, Sustaining and Expanding Diverse Magnet Schools

Southern Schools: More Than a Half-Century After the Civil Rights Revolution

Tue, 23 May 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Southern Schools: More Than a Half-Century After the Civil Rights Revolution

Two Decades After the Affirmative Action Ban: Evaluating the University of California’s Race-Neutral Efforts

Thu, 20 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Two Decades After the Affirmative Action Ban: Evaluating the University of California’s Race-Neutral Efforts

Texas Top Ten Percent Plan: How It Works, What Are Its Limits, and Recommendations to Consider

Thu, 20 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Texas Top Ten Percent Plan: How It Works, What Are Its Limits, and Recommendations to Consider

Our Segregated Capital: An Increasingly Diverse City with Racially Polarized Schools

Thu, 20 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Our Segregated Capital: An Increasingly Diverse City with Racially Polarized Schools

The Promise and Peril for Universities Using Correlates of Race in Admissions in Response to the Grutter and Fisher Decisions

Thu, 20 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

The Promise and Peril for Universities Using Correlates of Race in Admissions in Response to the Grutter and Fisher Decisions

Can Socioeconomic Status Substitute for Race in Affirmative Action College Admissions Policies? Evidence From a Simulation Model

Thu, 20 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Can Socioeconomic Status Substitute for Race in Affirmative Action College Admissions Policies? Evidence From a Simulation Model

The Hidden Cost of California's Harsh School Discipline

Thu, 20 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

The Hidden Cost of California's Harsh School Discipline

The Costs of High School Failure and School Suspensions for the State of California

Sun, 11 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

The Costs of High School Failure and School Suspensions for the State of California

The Economic Burden of High School Dropouts and School Suspensions in Florida

Sat, 10 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

The Economic Burden of High School Dropouts and School Suspensions in Florida

Amicus Curiae Brief in Hancock v. Driscoll