How to Close the Achievement Gap?

Use the data to introduce change to measure again in an ongoing cycle of improvement.

But how do we know what change to introduce?

November - December 2008 - Beth Hawkins and Cynthia Boyd of MinnPost: Five Part Series on Desegregation - In 1972, segregation in Minneapolis schools was so grave a federal judge ordered the city to begin busing students to achieve racial balance. Thirty-six years and several attempted reforms later, Twin Cities-area schools are more segregated than ever.

December 16, 2007 - In Minneapolis, a Block Transformed - Mixed housing creates family-safe neighborhoods, New York Times.

May 2007 - The Choice is Ours: Expanding Educational Opportunity for all Twin Cities Children - To help integrate schools, and ensure equal access to opportunity, affordable housing should not be concentrated in racially or economically segregated areas, and decisions to site units should be coordinated with an expanded school choice program so opportunities are available for families to live near their children’s schools in places where job opportunities also are more abundant, UMN Institute on Race & Poverty.

March 2006 - Minority Suburbanization and Racial Change - Pro-integrative policies must be regional in scope or the operations of metropolitan housing markets will undermine efforts to stabilize neighborhoods, and frustrate efforts to ensure that children and families have access to education and housing that is not determined by race and ethnicity, UMN Institute on Race & Poverty.