Gentrification and Schools

Through fifty-two interviews with New York City parents in gentrifying neighborhoods, this book examines the school choice process to determine how, through the compounding effect of these parents' many individual choices, a segregated urban school in a gentrifying neighborhood is able to transform into an integrated school.

"Jennifer Burns Stillman's Gentrification and Schools: The Process of Integration when Whites Reverse Flight is an excellent qualitative investigation of the perceptions of gentry parents about their children's education, the New York City schools they attend, and the processes of neighborhood and school choice. The book presents the rich voices of these parents about the challenges of sending their children to formerly segregated schools and provides an understanding of the ways in which they have contributed to school integration in New York City. Stillman provides an illuminating perspective on the views of these parents and frames them within the larger literature on gentrification, school choice, and desegregation." - Alan R. Sadovnik, Board of Governors Distinguished Service Professor, Rutgers University, co-editor of Palgrave Studies in Urban Education

"In many of our big cities, gentrification is offering a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to create racially and economically diverse public schools. Seizing this opportunity will take thoughtful leadership and great sensitivity to the hopes and dreams of all stakeholders. Jennifer Burns Stillman's landmark contribution paves the way." - Michael J. Petrilli, Executive Vice President, Thomas B. Fordham Institute

". . . a rich, nuanced, groundbreaking study . . . Gentrification and Schools is an outstanding, exciting book exploring a new urban frontier of racial conflict with unique fieldwork, a must read for students of integration generally and urban schooling in particular." - Journal of School Choice

JENNIFER BURNS STILLMAN is a Research Analyst at the Office of Innovation in the New York City Department of Education, USA.