3.0

credits

Average Course Rating

How do children end up attending the schools they do? Children in the United States have historically attended schools based on where they live, but school choice policies have changed how students are sorted into schools. This development is consequential for children’s schooling experiences, how schools and school systems operate, and the ways that schooling as an institution reflects and generates economic and racial inequalities. In this course, students will examine the different forms that school choice takes in the United States today as well as parents’ school decision-making. Drawing on insights from sociology as well as history, philosophy, and political science, this course will ask students to think critically about the ways that policy and parental decision-making intersect to shape children’s lives and the nation’s schools.