Poverty, Politics, and a “Circle of Promise”: Holistic Education Policy in Boston and the Challenge of Institutional Entrenchment

ABSTRACT:

Cash-strapped municipalities throughout the United States are increasingly proposing innovative education policies linking school-based reforms with neighborhood-level interventions. Boston is one such city. In this paper, we describe, analyze, and critique the City of Boston’s “Circle of Promise” initiative, a holistic education policy designed to coordinate school reforms with local community-based organizational resources. We link our discussion of challenges and critiques with the term “institutional entrenchment,” referring to institutional barriers to successful urban policies and the defense of the status quo. We conclude with suggestions for future policy to overcome the impediments of institutional entrenchment, and by extension, improve educational opportunities for students in underperforming urban schools.

Notes

1 The MCAS is a statewide, standardized test for grades 1–12, and is used by state education officials to comply with federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) performance standards. The exam procedure was introduced in Massachusetts following the Education Reform Law of 1993, and is analogous to standardized tests in other states.

2 We used ArcGIS Desktop 10.0 to create this figure. For each census tract, we normalized the percent African American by the median household income to create four ranges.

3 The issue of data sharing and institutional fragmentation is more complex than a simple BPS–City Hall fissure, however. BPS’ reticence to share individual-level student data—such as information on absences, grades, or standardized test scores—stems largely from their reading of federal data privacy laws, specifically the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). FERPA is designed to protect families from the illegitimate use of students’ personal information. The BPS legal team would cite these privacy laws when approached by representatives from the Mayor’s office looking for such data, since some level of personal information was required to link student academic records with records from other municipal departments. (Indeed, one of the paper’s authors was specifically asked by city policymakers to conduct research on FERPA restrictions to aid negotiations with BPS). So too did data privacy issues permeate the relationship between policymakers and private nonprofits. Nonprofits were equally reticent to share data on youth participants—especially those involved with the criminal justice system—for fear of inappropriate municipal intrusion into their participants’ lives. The privacy concerns from BPS and private nonprofits are no doubt warranted, but fragmented authority and information channels limited the ability of policymakers to institute the widespread reform they originally envisioned.

4 DSNI was ultimately unsuccessful in its implementation grant application.

5 An exception is the Metco Program, funded by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. As part of the program, approximately 3,200 minority students from Boston are bused from the city to wealthier suburban public schools. Participation in the program is highly competitive.

6 Recent developments in Boston put the future of busing in question. As of the writing of this article, the mayor has appointed an advisory group intended to reconsider the utility of school busing zones (Harmon, 2012). The group’s recommendations and ultimate outcome, however, remain unclear.