Do charter schools contribute to segregation, displacement, and gentrification?
Segregation: A study by the Project for Civil Rights at Harvard University shows that charter schools contribute to segregation by race and class. Charters can purposefully attract a certain type of student through targeted recruitment and niche marketing. Being a parent of a charter student generally requires far more resources (for transportation, system navigation, student fees and parent volunteering), which further discriminates against lower-income families. Also, if students do not fit in with the school’s mission for disciplinary, academic, or social reasons, they can be dismissed midyear or asked not to return the next year. With this kind of subjective student selection, charter schools are clearly achieving a separate and unequal education based on race and class. Privatization: Charters are an important step towards systematic privatization in which corporations and wealthy individuals make decisions for everyone else about how students are educated, what communities need,
