Unwitting Accomplices: Equal Treatment and the Perpetuation of Racialized Information Inequality in School Choice

Abstract

Abstract In public education, racially segregated schools are now often understood as a natural result of a messy mix of failed policies and parent decisions. However, parent decisions and school choice are both constrained by districts. In the case of Boston Public Schools (BPS), the staff hired to support “well-informed choices” do not provide information to families—including those who need it most—even when it could mitigate known inequities. Using data from semi-structured interviews with 37 staff, participant observation in registration sites, a supplemental survey of 1,887 registering families, and district administrative data on all registering families, I find that BPS constrains the actions of frontline staff, making them unwitting proponents of the fallacy of choice. The equal treatment of families who come with unequal access to the registration and choice systems protects racial privilege in relation to schools and harms both families of color and the staff of color who work with them. This racism of omission enacted within the choice apparatus causes staff and families to focus on the selection process rather than the limited and racialized access to the public good of schools.