School integration/segregation

See our "Why School Integration" page for a comprehensive understanding and definitions related to school integration and segregation. Achieving integrated schools require reducing school segregation as a first step.

Relevant schools in analyses

Our analyses, unless stated otherwise, include all public schools located in Oakland that fall into the following categories: Elementary Schools, Middle Schools, Junior High Schools, High Schools, K-12 Schools. We include charter schools that are authorized by either Oakland Unified or Alameda County as long as they are located in Oakland. The only school excluded from these categories is the "Home and Hospital" program.

Oakland Unified Enrollment Policy

District-run schools are governed by a student assignment policy that includes neighborhood/sibling preference and a general lottery as part of open enrollment.

District-/OUSD-run vs public charter schools

District-run schools are administered by OUSD whereas charter schools are independently run. Charter schools receive public and private funding and are still subject to various public guidelines but largely operate (and enroll students) under their own methods. 

Data Sources

All poverty and race data has been gathered from the California Department of Education. Any Census related data is based on estimates from the most recent (2018) 5-year American Community Survey (ACS). Data related to school choice is from Oakland Unified's public data dashboards.  

FRL / low-income students

Students who classify for free or reduced-price lunch (FRL) are often classified as low-income. While imperfect, eligibility for the National School Lunch Program is a common proxy for poverty.

Attendance Boundaries

The geographic areas within which students are given preference for one or more local neighborhood schools as part of the OUSD-run student assignment lottery. 

OUSD / Oakland Unified School District

The full-service community school district of Oakland. OUSD operates about 74 "relevant" (see above) schools compared to about 32 independently-run charter schools that fall under OUSD's authorization.

High- and low-poverty schools

High-poverty schools may traditionally refer to schools that enroll students where over 75% are classified as low-income. For our purposes, unless stated otherwise, we classify high-poverty schools as those whose poverty rate is at least 15% above the district average poverty rate; low-poverty schools are at least 15% below the average poverty rate.