Fall 2019 Journal: Race, Segregation, and Education in Georgia

October 16, 2019 bppj Education, Race 0

This article is the fourth article featured in our Fall 2019 journal. For the complete journal, please see the “Journal Archive” tab above.

by Joseph Monardo

Edited by: Lisa McCorkell and Nandita Sampath

This paper focuses on the connection between race and education in the state of Georgia. Although a historical center of African American success, a central setting for the Civil Rights Movement, and home to “the city too busy to hate,” Georgia has an overwhelming history of segregated populations and segregated schools. Even today, Georgia’s schools exhibit significant levels of racial segregation and corresponding differences in the student outcomes they produce. Viewing Georgia’s racist history as a foundation,  I conducted original research using enrollment and assessment data from the Georgia Department of Education to provide a descriptive analysis of race and education in the modern context. Looking at the forces driving the perseverance of racial segregation in modern schools, themes of residential segregation, private schooling, voucher programs, and school tracking are all relevant. I also discuss the Atlanta Public Schools cheating scandal and state’s cityhood movement as they are relevant to race and schooling. By investigating the historical role of race in Georgia’s education system and the role of race in modern Georgia, this paper delivers a survey that begins to unpack the complicated realities that play a fundamental role in the state’s education system.

Introduction

Racism and segregation have been inextricable from education policy in the United States since the country’s inception. Perhaps more than in other regions and due to a history of formalized segregation, the connection between race and education is especially clear in the American South. This paper focuses on that connection between race and education in Georgia. Although parts of the state — particularly the metropolitan Atlanta area — distinguish themselves from much of the South through their urbanicity and progressivity, Georgia is not exempt from the shameful history of the region. On the contrary, even in the capital, education has been paradigmatic of the structural inequity that preferences whiteness at the expense of Black students. Nearly 65 years after Brown v. Board of Education deemed racial segregation unconstitutional, and nearly 50 years after most Georgia school districts formally desegregated, the state’s school system continues to reveal sharp educational differences based on race, many of which are rooted in the policies of racist segregation in the state’s past.

This paper provides a brief background on the moments, policies, and movements that defined K-12 schooling in Georgia during the 20th century. Then, I discuss the role of race in the current landscape of Georgia schools.

My own experiences as a resident and student in Atlanta inform this paper. The severe limits of my perspective as a white student are, in some ways, representative of the core problem. I attended a private Catholic school in Buckhead, one of Atlanta’s wealthiest areas, on a site that previously served as the Imperial Palace of the Ku Klux Klan [1]. Georgia schools’ ties to the state’s racist history are not always as explicit, but they are always present.

Georgia: A History of Segregation

Racism and Racial Progress in Georgia

Georgia’s racist past began with its founding in 1732 and endured after its readmittance to the United States in 1870 following the Civil War [2, 3]. Despite the intensity of Georgia’s racist past — or perhaps because of it — it eventually became home to pioneering progress in racial equality and Black empowerment. Over several decades, various organizations and a vast network of Black educators pursued racial justice in Georgia, including school integration and part of the broader Civil Rights Movement [4]. All the while, Atlanta’s political and business leaders branded the state capital as “the city too busy to hate,” aiming to obscure the complex reality of racial struggle for the sake of economic growth [5].

Decades of Battles over Segregated Schools

In reality, Atlanta’s industriousness was never enough to evade the same forms of racist segregation that defined much of the South, and, by the middle of the 20th century, it certainly was not too busy to hate. In 1946, Eugene Talmadge won a fourth term as Georgia governor by employing violence and fraud to disenfranchise Black voters [6]; subsequently, his son, Herman Talmadge, presided over a period of intensified segregation and increased violence against Black leaders [7]. After the Supreme Court delivered the Brown decision in 1954, Georgia’s political leaders amended the state constitution to deny funding to any schools that attempted to desegregate [8].

Georgia’s strategy of overt noncompliance with federal law was bound to be short-lived. Eventually state legislation freed schools to desegregate, but districts often found ways to postpone making any changes [9]. Around the same time, the national government was taking additional steps to desegregate schools throughout the country, passing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Elementary and Secondary Education Action (ESEA) of 1965, and requiring Southern states to not discriminate based on race in order to claim some of ESEA’s $1 billion [10].

Even with legal and financial reasons to desegregate, white school boards in Georgia largely refused. By the end of the 1960s, action from parties including Martin Luther King Jr., Dr. Horace Tate, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), and the Georgia Teachers & Education Association (GT&EA) achieved just enough racial progress in Georgia schools to satisfy the courts but not enough to truly impact the dominance of segregation. However, after the merger of the white Georgia Educators Association (GEA) and the Black GT&EA, segregation action almost always resulted in reductions in the number of Black teachers and administrators throughout the South, laying the groundwork for persistent educational disparities in the following decades [11].

Desegregation Action in the 1970s

With the turn of the decade and the election of Governor Jimmy Carter, school desegregation in Georgia gained renewed, albeit muted, momentum [12]. While the state as a whole saw integration as a marginally more viable reality, progress in Atlanta remained uneven. Following years of resistance or partial compliance, Atlanta’s education leaders ultimately reached a desegregation plan in 1973 [13]. The plan dramatically decreased the number of segregated schools (defined as more than 90 percent Black or white), but the prescribed integration only went one way: the plan redistributed Black students to eradicate all 20 of the segregated white schools while leaving 83 of the 86 segregated Black schools intact [14]. The formal busing programs established under the compromise were limited in scope; the major instrument was the expansion of the district’s “voluntary student transportation plan to encourage more Blacks to attend majority-white schools and more whites to attend majority-Black schools” [15].

Overall, the desegregation compromise allowed white leaders to resolve outstanding legal challenges while transferring control of the schools to Black leaders moving forward [16]. An unanticipated but — given the clear history of anti-Black racism in city, state, and country — unsurprising consequence of the transfer of power, business involvement in Atlanta’s education system all but disappeared. Student performance noticeably deteriorated in the following two decades and enrollment in Atlanta public schools nearly halved, shrinking from 119,000 in 1975 to 60,000 in 1995 [17].

The Enduring Effects of Segregation in Modern Georgia

Descriptive Analysis of Racial Segregation in Georgia

Descriptive studies of Georgia schools today leave no doubt that race remains crucial in educational opportunity and student outcomes. Analyzing data from the Georgia Department of Education and the U.S. Census demonstrates that clear racial disparities exist both in school attendance and performance measures.

In the 2017-2018 school year, Georgia’s public school system was comprised of 2,271 schools and 1.77 million students [18]. Remarkably, more than six decades after the Brown decision, 9.7 percent of those schools have student populations more than 90 percent Black; an additional 2.8 percent have student populations more than 90 percent White.

There are noticeable differences in measured student outcomes based on the racial characteristics of a school’s student body. A straightforward assessment of whether all students receive equal opportunity to succeed in school is to look for differences in state-measured student outcomes. Georgia uses the College and Career Ready Performance Index (CCRPI) to measure school performance, a metric the Georgia Department of Education touts as “a comprehensive school improvement, accountability, and communication platform for all educational stakeholders that will promote college and career readiness for all Georgia public school students” [19]. The DOE weighs four or five categories (depending on grade level) to generate the holistic score, which they use to grade success at the school, district, and state level [20]:

  1. Content proficiency: scores on state assessments in English language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies
  2. Student progress: student growth relative to academically-similar students
  3. Closing gaps: the extent to which students are meeting the annual achievement improvement target
  4. Readiness at year end: for elementary- and middle-school students, based on literacy and attendance; for high-school students, based on demonstrated college and career readiness
  5. Graduation rate (high-school only): emphasizes four-year graduation rate while including five-year graduates

CCRPI scores can range from 0 to 110, and in 2017 actual school scores ranged from 16 to 108. Along with their composite score, schools receive a corresponding letter grade: “A” for a CCRPI at or above 90, “B” for a score between 80 and 90, etc. The Georgia Department of Education provides CCRPI numeric scores for the three school years between 2015 and 2017; the school grade assignments are available for the period between 2013 and 2017.

In 2017, the average school received a CCRPI of 74.33. However, among the 2.8 percent of schools with nearly-all-white student bodies, the average score was 79.55. In the 9.7 percent of schools with nearly-all-Black student bodies, the average score was noticeably lower than average: 62.33. Taking the dataset as a whole, there is evidence of a negative correlation between the share of students who are Black and the school’s CCRPI, as shown in the figure below (also linked here).

It is important to acknowledge that Georgia schools exhibit significant variation in measurable outcomes that are not entirely described by their racial composition. Additionally, putting too much weight on a state-level metric — even one which aims to be comprehensive in scope — can be dangerously reductive. Various research has shown that Eurocentric pedagogies put Black students and other students of color at a disadvantage, and Eurocentric examinations only exacerbate that phenomenon. In short, the dual concerns here are that (1) the share of Black students is not determinative of a school’s CCRPI and (2) the CCRPI is an incomplete measure of student performance to begin with. Both concerns are undeniably valid [21]. Despite those concerns, this analysis views school-level Black student share and CCRPI simultaneously to draw attention to the problem of school segregation in the state. After state and city politics eradicated the Black teachers’ organization and denied Black students equal opportunity, it is worthwhile to hold the state accountable for the impacts of its actions.

Some variation in school performance appears to be due to differential enrollment patterns within districts and is not purely the product of underlying geographic differences. Within the 12,000-seat district of Troup County, for example, the 18 schools display dramatic differences in the racial makeup of their student populations. Rosemont Elementary School has a student body that is 11 percent Black, while eight miles down the road Berta Weathersbee Elementary is 84 percent Black. The two schools are emblematic of notable segregation in the district as a whole. Figure 2 below shows the Black student share at each school in the district from 1994 to 2017 (also linked here).

Troup County operated an intensely-segregated district in the 1990s before it faced pressure to meet the desegregation obligations imposed upon it in a 1969 Northern District of Georgia injunction [22]. In May 1995, the United States sued the county, and a district judge approved a new consent decree to implement an updated desegregation plan. The consent decree imposed new desegregation obligations on Troup while granting it the right to apply for “unitary status” and a dismissal of the injunction after three years of compliance. The legal intervention did not even last that long: in 1997, the same judge terminated the agreement, agreeing with Troup that it was not subject to further court oversight because it had already received unitary status in a different 1973 decree [23]. Troup County’s school demographics show the fleeting success of the court’s action and the steady re-segregation that occurred thereafter (as seen in Figure 2).  

A larger portion of the racial segregation in schools corresponds with differences in population characteristics by geography. In the Atlanta metropolitan area — inclusive of Atlanta Public Schools and several county-based school districts — schools to the north (in suburbs like Kennesaw, Marietta, and Alpharetta) enroll predominantly white students, while schools to the south (across neighborhoods like East Point, College Park, and Forest Park) enroll mostly Black students. 

The large, oddly shaped district of Fulton County is one of the state’s largest. Although Fulton constitutes a single school district, most of the land is divided into 15 separate cities. The newest city of the bunch is South Fulton, incorporated through a ballot initiative process in 2017. On top of the micro-segregation of cities within Fulton, the entire county is effectively divided between North Fulton and South Fulton. Figure 3 below reveals the racial difference between the two regions of the county and the corresponding differences in student outcomes (interactive version linked here).

Troup and Fulton are both particularly dramatic reminders of the undeniable reality that racial segregation exists in modern-day Georgia; however, the full school segregation story is infinitely more complex than any two districts can tell. One obvious shortcoming of this analysis has been its exclusive focus on Black students, with comparison groups being non-Black students or white students. In many ways, that likely is the most important racial distinction to make in descriptive studies of Georgia, given the established history of anti-Black sentiment and policy. Regardless, race and racial segregation are undoubtedly relevant factors to education in the state in ways that extend beyond the Black/white divide. Students of Hispanic or Latinx heritage comprise 15.6 percent of the students in Georgia public schools in 2018, and students who identify as Asian are 4.1 percent of the entire student body [24]. In some districts, the percentages are much higher. 

Identifying Mechanisms for the Endurance of Racial Segregation

Georgia is not the only state in which schools have tended toward segregation, and considerable research has identified patterns of racial difference in education. The most obvious factor that contributes to school segregation is residential segregation. Numerous authors — including Richard Rothstein in The Color of Law — have chronicled the United States’ history of inequitable housing laws that intentionally excluded Black Americans and other people of color from certain areas and denied them the access to credit and favorable mortgages that white people enjoyed [25]. Rothstein shows a 1938 map of Atlanta from the government-sponsored Home Owners Loan Corporation which denotes areas with large Black -American populations as “hazardous” areas for mortgage lenders [26]. Academic research confirms the enduring effect of inequitable lending practices and other discriminatory policies and practices: racial segregation exists in Georgia to this day [27].

Historical exclusion of Black populations, today preserved through public- and affordable-housing efforts which fail to challenge pre-existing segregation, helped create and perpetuate the correlations between low-income neighborhoods, nonwhite residents, and low resource levels in schools and other services. There are myriad factors that deserve correcting to address racial inequity in Georgia, but neighbors sorting into schools nonetheless has a role to play. Unfortunately, due to the Supreme Court precedent established in Parents Involved (2007), governments face severe restrictions to the active steps they are permitted to take to battle neighborhood segregation in schools, even when the desire and political will exist [28].   

The role of parental choice remains another relevant factor in the endurance of segregation. First, many white Georgians exert their privilege to opt out of the public system by enrolling their children in private school. The Georgia Department of Education lists 630 registered private schools for the 2018 school year [29], and estimates of the number of Georgia students in private schools range from 155,000 [30] to 200,000 [31]. Either way, private-school students represent between 8 and 10 percent of the school’s K-12 population and are growing, up 31 percent since 1997 and outpacing public-school enrollment growth during that time. Given that private-school tuition is on average $11,000 per year, children from high-income families are fueling that growth. Even controlling for income and parental education, white students are more likely to attend private school than any other racial subcategory [32]. Across the South, private-school enrollment surged from 1950 to 1965 and has grown since 1980, while other regions are seeing their private-school figures shrink [33]. The Southern Education Foundation, in a comprehensive 2016 report on private schools, identified Georgia as one of the states with the largest overrepresentation of white students in private schools: although less than half of Georgia’s school-age students are white, they take up three-quarters of seats in private schools. Black students comprise only 16.0 percent of private-school attendees in Georgia, despite representing 35.1 percent of all school-age youth [34].

Public versus private schooling is not the only instance in which private choice comes to the fore of race and education in Georgia. Statewide voucher programs and state tax credits to support student attendance in private schools are ways in which state policy reinforces the private system’s segregating effects [35]. The developed charter movement in Georgia also carries with it racial implications, as research has shown charter schools to facilitate a return to school segregation in diversifying districts [36]. Currently, 115 charter schools operate within the Georgia public school system, and an additional 326 schools operate within 32 state charter systems [37]. Although they are sometimes employed as productive mechanisms to reduce inequity in the school system and distribute opportunity beyond neighborhood boundaries, magnet and charter schools introduce a stratification within the education system that tends to favor families who bring more privilege into the enrollment process. Saporito (2003) studies the public consequences of individual family choices and presents evidence that higher-status families make school choices to avoid schools populated by low-income or minority students, ultimately increasing segregation independent of district policies [38]. In podcasts and articles, Nikole Hannah-Jones explores the protectionism and racism fueling efforts to circumvent integration, but also adds a nuanced reflection of the difficulty of making enrollment decisions [39].

Even within schools, egregious instances of tracking and other forms of disparate treatment can recreate some of the most harmful effects of school segregation. A 2018 New Yorker article identifies Georgia’s special-education system as a particularly dramatic example, as educators and administrators disproportionately channel Black students into neglected programs [40]. Black students in Georgia are 3.6 times as likely to face suspension as white students, and are half as likely to enroll in at least one Advanced Placement course while in high school [41]. In Atlanta Public Schools, Black students receive suspensions at a rate more than 20 times that of white students [42].

A high-profile cheating scandal in Atlanta Public Schools, first uncovered in 2008 but contested until 2012, represents another collision of race and education. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution pushed the allegations in their early stages, partially prompted by suspiciously-large improvements in state test scores at 12 schools [43]. Ultimately, the conclusive report cited 178 teachers, principals, and administrators who participated in the scheme across 44 schools, which the Superintendent aimed to obscure by destroying evidence and withholding information [44]. The scandal speaks quite clearly to issues of racial segregation and inequality, although its precise message is not clear. The teachers who perpetrated the cheating were working in the capital of a state that had destroyed Black teacher advocacy groups, fired Black teachers, and disinvested from Black schools for decades. Around the time of the scandal, Black men made up just eight percent of teachers in metro Atlanta and Black women constituted another 25 percent [45]. Black students comprised 80 percent of the student population, 98 percent of those expelled, and only half of those designated for Gifted and Talented programs. Given the historical context and the marked differences in the treatment of Black students within the education system, changing test scores could charitably be understood as a gloss-over to endemic problems rather than the principal offense against Atlanta’s students [46]. Even if it was a desperate response to an impossibly-biased system, the widespread cheating evidenced a failing of Atlanta educators to responsibly contribute to student success [47].

Further complicating the school segregation narrative in Georgia, there are many examples of public schools that educate mostly Black students and score highly on the CCRPI, as alluded to above. In some circumstances, it may be the case that segregated schooling serves Black students much better than integrated schooling does. The period of desegregation in the United States was certainly not unilaterally beneficial for Black communities, and the obstinate politicking that accompanied the period in Georgia sheds some light on why that was the case.

Conclusion

In some ways, the endurance of Georgia’s history of racial segregation is not surprising: today’s racial disparities are, tragically, a coherent extension of centuries of explicit policies of segregation and hate-based racism deeply held by private actors and public leaders. Nonetheless, it is necessary to recognize the very real effect that history continues to have on students of color, and especially Black students, in Georgia.  

Reflecting back, my own primary education in Atlanta stands out as a particularly powerful distillation of the way race and education interact in Georgia. After the Klan’s Imperial Palace went into foreclosure in the 1930s, the Catholic Church purchased the land that would eventually become the Cathedral and school I attended. With this purchase, the Catholic Church was taking advantage of an opportunity that was undoubtedly not available to Black Atlantans. Nearly 90 years later, a former Klan property has transformed into a private school that offers wealthy parents a venue in which they can evade the deficiencies they perceive in Georgia’s public schools. Based on online estimates, less than one percent of students at the school today are Black [48]. The white hoods have — mostly — disappeared from Georgia as signs of a dominant racist structure, but the reality of segregation remains. 

For current and future policymakers in Georgia, meaningful school integration should be among the most pressing priorities. One way to diversify schools and increase equitable access is to expand interdistrict choice programs. The state currently allows intradistrict choice — meaning students can attend a different school within their own district as long as space exists [49]. Districts can voluntarily permit interdistrict transfers — which provide the opportunity for movement across district lines — but only if the student’s assigned school is 15 miles farther away and takes 45 more minutes to get to than the receiving school; and both the home and receiving school boards must approve the transfer [50]. For intra and interdistrict transfers, the student’s family must arrange transportation and pay for any associated expenses. Making interdistrict choice programs mandatory for all districts, removing distance restrictions, and guaranteeing state-provided transportation for every student would all be steps in the right direction. 

A more fundamental and enduring need is for public schools to remain fully funded moving forward. Governor Nathan Deal’s final budget in 2018 fully funded schools for the first time since the introduction of austerity cuts in 2003 [51]. Georgia’s new Governor has allocated even more money for schools in his 2020 budget [52]. However, many school districts will continue to face financial stress resulting from a funding system that relies heavily on local sources. Until Georgia addresses the disparities in school quality and racialized attendance patterns, educational inequity will remain the dominant reality. 

___________________________________________________________________________

Joseph Monardo (MPP ’19) is an alumna of the Goldman School of Public Policy, and a former Editor-in-Chief of the Berkeley Public Policy Journal.

Endnotes

  1.  “Our Story.” Cathedral of Christ the King. https://cathedralctk.com/ourstory/
  2. “US States: Georgia”. History. https://www.history.com/topics/us-states/georgia
  3. “The New South”. Khan Academy. https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/the-gilded-age/south-after-civil-war/a/the-new-south
  4. “Bridging the Gap: The Commission on Interracial Cooperation.” Documenting the American South. https://docsouth.unc.edu/highlights/cic.html
  5. Ambrose, Andy. “Four Things You Should Know About Atlanta.” American Historical Association. 1 December, 2006. https://www.historians.org/annual-meeting/past-meetings/supplement-to-the-121st-annual-meeting/four-things-you-should-know-about-atlanta
  6. Tuck, Stephen. “Civil Rights Movement.” New Georgia Encyclopedia. 16 September, 2018. https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/civil-rights-movement
  7. Ibid. 
  8. Huff, Christopher Allen. “Sibley Commission.” New Georgia Encyclopedia. 13 July, 2018. https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/education/sibley-commission
  9. Ibid.
  10. Siddle Walker, Vanessa. The Lost Education of Horace Tate. The New Press. July 2018.
  11. Oakley, Deirdre, Jacob Stowell, and John R. Logan. “The Impact of Desegregation on Black Teachers in the Metropolis, 1970-2000.” Ethn Racial Stud. 2009; 39(9): 1576-1598.  
  12. Drawbaugh, David. “Integration of Atlanta Public Schools in the 1970s.” Dickinson College History 118: U.S. History Since 1877. 8 December, 2017. http://blogs.dickinson.edu/hist-118pinsker/2017/12/08/desegregation-of-atlanta-public-schools/ 
  13. Research Atlanta, Inc. “Analysis of Atlanta Compromise Desegregation Plan.” 18 March,
  14. Research Atlanta, Inc. “Analysis of Atlanta Compromise Desegregation Plan.” 18 March, 1973. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED074203.pdf
  15. Ibid.
  16. Stone, Clarence H. “Civic Capacity and Urban Education.” Urban Affairs Review, Vol. 36, No. 5, May 2001.
  17. Stone, Clarence H. “Civic Capacity and Urban Education.” Urban Affairs Review, Vol. 36, No. 5, May 2001.
  18. “Enrollment by Ethnicity/Race and Gender.” Georgia Department of Education. https://oraapp.doe.k12.ga.us/ows-bin/owa/fte_pack_ethnicsex_pub.entry_form. 
  19. “College and Career Ready Performance Index.” Georgia Department of Education. http://www.gadoe.org/CCRPI/Pages/default.aspx
  20. Detailed information about the weighting of the five characteristics is provided in the Appendix. 
  21. Xendi, Ibram X. “Why the Academic Achievement Gap Is a Racist Idea.” African American Intellectual History Society. 20 October, 2016. https://www.aaihs.org/why-the-academic-achievement-gap-is-a-racist-idea/
  22. “United States v. State of Georgia Troup County.” FindLaw. 8 April, 1999.  https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-11th-circuit/1068802.html 
  23. Ibid.
  24. “Enrollment by Ethnicity/Race and Gender.” Georgia Department of Education. https://oraapp.doe.k12.ga.us/ows-bin/owa/fte_pack_ethnicsex_pub.entry_form.
  25. Rothstein, Richard. The Color of Law: a Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America. Liveright Publishing Corporation, a Division of W.W. Norton & Company, 2018.
  26. Givens, Darin. “Atlanta’s Patterns of Segregation and Where They Originate”. Medium. 2 September, 2017. https://medium.com/@daringivens/atlantas-patterns-of-segregation-and-where-they-originated-2b13b89092af
  27. Hayes, Melissa Mae. “The Building Blocks of Atlanta: Racial Residential Segregation and Neighborhood Inequity.” ScholarWorks at Georgia State University. August 2006. https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1009&context=sociology_theses
  28. Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School District Number 1. (Nos. 05- 908 and 05-915). 28 June, 2007. Chief Justice Breyer, majority opinion.
  29. “List of Private Schools for FY2019.” Georgia Department of Education. https://app3.doe.k12.ga.us/ows-bin/owa/psc_pack_mainmenu.pvsch_list_public?p_sort=1
  30. “Top Georgia Private Schools.” Private School Review. https://www.privateschoolreview.com/georgia
  31. Stirgus, Eric. “Georgia Private School Students Courted by Public Schools.” The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. 8 November, 2016. https://www.myajc.com/news/local-education/georgia-private-school-students-courted-public-systems/iV3fwKsgDGqbC1FnsrBvfN/
  32. Kolko, Jed. “Where Private School Enrollment is Highest and Lowest Across the U.S.” Citylab. 13 August, 2014. https://www.citylab.com/equity/2014/08/where-private-school-enrollment-is-highest-and-lowest-across-the-us/375993/
  33. Suitts, Steve. “Race and Ethnicity in a New Era of Public Funding of Private Schools: Private School Enrollment in the South and the Nation”. Southern Education Foundation. 2016. http://www.southerneducation.org/getattachment/be785c57-6ce7-4682-b80d-04d89994a0b6/Race-and-Ethnicity-in-a-New-Era-of-Public-Funding.aspx
  34. Ibid. pp. 18
  35. Ibid. pp. 2
  36. Evans, Lorraine and Linda A. Renzulli. “School Choice, Charter Schools, and White Flight”. 52 Soc. Probs 398 (2005).
  37. “Charter School Basics.” Georgia Department of Education. http://www.gadoe.org/External-Affairs-and-Policy/Charter-Schools/Pages/General-Frequently-Asked-Questions.aspx
  38. Saporito, Salvatore. “Private Choices, Public Consequences: Magnet School Choice and Segregation by Race and Poverty.” 50 Soc. Probs. 181 (2003).
  39. Hannah Jones, Nikole. “Episode 562: The Problem We All Live With.” This American Life. 31 July, 2015. https://www.thisamericanlife.org/562/the-problem-we-all-live-with-part-one
  40. Aviv, Rachel. The New Yorker. “Georgia’s Separate and Unequal Special Education System.” 1 October, 2018. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/10/01/georgias-separate-and-unequal-special-education-system
  41. “Miseducation: Georgia Schools.” Propublica. October 2018. https://projects.propublica.org/miseducation/state/GA
  42. “Miseducation: Atlanta City Schools.” Propublica. October 2018. https://projects.propublica.org/miseducation/district/1300120
  43. Perry, John. “Are Drastic Swings in CRCT Scores Valid?” The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. 5 July, 2011. 
  44. “A Timeline of How the Atlanta School Cheating Scandal Unfolded.” The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. 2 April, 2015. 
  45. Walker, Marion A. “Black Male Teachers Scarce in Metro Despite Need, Benefits.” The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. 9 April, 2016. https://www.myajc.com/news/local-education/black-male-teachers-scarce-metro-despite-need-benefits/6cXXUn8f0fjG26TWGw64hI/
  46. Cooper, Brittney. “America is Criminalizing Black Teachers: Atlanta’s Cheating and the Racist Underbelly of Education Reform.” Salon. 8 April, 2015. https://www.salon.com/2015/04/08/america_is_criminalizing_black_teachers_atlantas_cheating_scandal_and_the_racist_underbelly_of_education_reform/
  47. Hicks, Victoria. “The Complicated Role of Race in the APS Case.” The Atlanta Journal Constitution. 29 April, 2015. https://www.myajc.com/news/local/the-complicated-role-race-the-aps-case/XuLrmVHEAO7CzsnXXTkwCM/
  48. “Christ the King School.” Great Schools. https://www.greatschools.org/georgia/atlanta/1854-Christ-The-King-School/
  49. “Intra District Transfers.” Georgia Department of Education. http://www.gadoe.org/School-Improvement/Federal-Programs/title-i/Pages/Intra-District-Transfers.aspx
  50. “Open Enrollment Policies: State Profile – Georgia.” Education Commission of the States. October 2017. http://ecs.force.com/mbdata/mbstprofile?rep=OE17ST&st=Georgia
  51. “Governor Signs New Georgia Budget that Finally Fully Funds Schools”. The Atlanta Journal Constitution. 2 May 2019. https://www.ajc.com/news/state–regional-govt–politics/governor-signs-new-georgia-budget-that-finally-fully-funds-schools/216udSOWicdrw7q9hmNQmJ/
  52. Owens, Stephen. “Overview: 2020 Fiscal Budget for K-12 Education”. Georgia Budget & Policy Institute. 1 February, 2019. https://gbpi.org/2019/overview-2020-georgia-budget-k-12-education/