2009 - Parental Choice in the Netherlands: Growing Concerns about Segregation

Attribution: Ladd, Helen F., Fiske, Edward B., & Ruijs, Nienke
Researchers: Edward B. FiskeHelen F. LaddNienke Ruijs
University Affiliation: Duke University
Email: Hladd@duke.edu
Research Question:
This paper examines why segregation by educational disadvantage has only recently emerged as a policy issue in the Netherlands. In addition, it documents the levels and trends ofschool segregation in Dutch cities.
Published: 0
Journal Name or Institutional Affiliation: N/A
Journal Entry: N/A
Year: 2009
Findings:
  • Close to 80 percent of the disadvantaged immigrant students in the four big cities are in schools with more than a majority of students like themselves and that the percentage increased, but only slightly, over the nine-year period.
  • The isolation index indicates that the typical disadvantaged immigrant student living in one of the big four cities was in a school with 70 percent or more disadvantaged immigrant students throughout the period
  • The dissimilarity index indicates, for example, that more than 60 percent of the pupils would have to be moved to other schools in order to achieve balance, and the segregation index indicates that the gap between the exposure rate of the typical native Dutch student to disadvantaged immigrant pupils and the maximum possible average exposure rate in each city is 45 percent of the maximum exposure rate.
  • Segregation is lowest in Amsterdam but has been rising somewhat over time, that segregation in the Hague is the highest of the four cities in every year and has been rising, and that segregation in Utrecht has also been also been rising
  • Only in Rotterdam has segregation been consistently falling. The downward trend in Rotterdam coincides with a downward trend in residential segregation in that city.
  • With the exception of The Hague, the trends in school segregation mimic the trends in residential segregation.
Keywords: ChoiceImmigrantsResidential SegregationSegregationRegions: InternationalMethodologies: QuantitativeResearch Designs: Secondary DataAnalysis Methods: Descriptive Statistics Sampling Frame:Population
Sampling Types: PopulationAnalysis Units: SchoolData Types: Quantitative-Longitudinal
Data Description:
  • Focuses exclusively on primary schools, which in the Netherlands serve children from age 4 to age 12
  • Covers 1997-2005
  • Use five separate measures that reflect different aspects of the extent to which disadvantaged immigrants are segregated from other students. The five measures are grouped into two categories, and are calculated separately for each city.
  • Measures of isolation:
    • 1. Fraction of disadvantaged immigrant pupils in schools with more than 50 percent of such pupils.
    • 2. Fraction of disadvantaged immigrant students in schools with more than 70 percent of such students.
    • 3. Isolation index (I) : A measure of the extent to which disadvantaged immigrant pupils are in schools with other pupils like themselves.
  • Measures of imbalance:
    • 1. Dissimilarity index (DIS); A measure of the extent to which disadvantaged immigrants are unevenly distributed across schools.
    • 2. Segregation Index (S): A gap based measure of segregation that, like the dissimilarity index, measures the extent to which schools are unbalanced.
  • DV: School segregation
  • IV: Parental choice, immigrant status
Theoretical Framework:
Relevance:
Archives: K-12 Integration, Desegregation, and Segregation Abstracts