Come, Let Us Begin the Discussion about Segregation and Education in Richmond

excerpted from:

http://civilrightsproject.ucla.edu/research/k-12-education/integration-and-diversity/miles-to-go-a-report-on-school-segregation-in-virginia-1989-2010/siegel-hawley-miles-to-go-2013.pdf

Richmond-Petersburg

"The share of white students in the Richmond-Petersburg metro declined by almost

ten percentage points to 51% between 1989 and 2010, even as the share of the

black enrollment remained steady at 37%.

The percentage of Asian and Latino students enrolled in Richmond-Petersburg

metro schools increased considerably over the past twenty years.

Since 1989, white students made up 10% or less of the enrollment in Richmond-

Petersburg’s urban schools.

The share of whites in metro area suburban schools fell from about 73% in 1989

to 50% in 2010.

Much of the increase in suburban diversity can be attributed to rising shares of

black students attending suburban schools—up to a little over a third of the

enrollment by 2010.

More than one in three black students in the Richmond area went to an intensely

segregated minority school in 2010, roughly two times as many as Norfolk-

Virginia Beach-Newport News (and five times as many as Northern Virginia).

Almost one in ten Richmond area black students attended apartheid settings

where white students made up less than 1% of the enrollment.

Nearly 14% of Latino students attended intensely segregated settings in 2010;

more than triple the share attending such schools in 1989.

Approximately 18% of all schools in the metro were intensely segregated in 2010.

Just over 4% of Richmond-Petersburg area schools were apartheid settings.

Fully 85% of students in apartheid schools were low-income in 2010, as were

75% of students in intensely segregated minority schools.

The typical black student in the Richmond metro attended a school where low-

income students accounted for nearly 52% of the enrollment. Meanwhile, white

students went to a school where low-income students, on average, made up about

24% of the enrollment—almost a 30 percentage point white-black disparity in

exposure to poverty.

In earlier years, the vast majority of segregation—about 72%—occurred between

districts in the Richmond-Petersburg metro (e.g., between Richmond City and

Henrico and Chesterfield counties). More recently, however, segregation levels

have been roughly the same within and between districts.

Between 1999 and 2010, the overall share of diverse school districts 

in the Richmond-Petersburg metro grew substantially, from roughly 46% to 54%.

Still, almost 40% of Richmond-Petersburg districts were stably segregated,

reporting racially isolated white environments or racially isolated nonwhite

environments."