In many cases, the end of mandatory racial integration signaled a return to neighborhood schools segregated by race and class. Frustrated by this development, some leaders of poor minority communities have come to believe that, since integration appears to be unattainable, it makes more sense to upgrade high-poverty neighborhood schools than to bus children to other schools. The problem with this approach is that high-poverty schools don't work very well, even when they receive additional funding. In a country that is predominantly middle class, every child in America should have the right to attend a school where the majority of students come from middle-class backgrounds. The goal should be to integrate students from these high-poverty schools with students in other schools, so that all schools would have a student population that is majority middle class.
Socioeconomic integration serves two major goals.
First, for those of us concerned about racial integration, it will promote a great deal of racial diversity. Second, and more important, socioeconomic integration gets at the core issue that drives school quality. Studies have found that the positive benefits of racial integration, in terms of achievement by blacks, came not from black children sitting next to white children, but from poor children being exposed to the culture of a predominantly middle-class school. Because students pattern their study habits, vocabulary, and levels of aspiration from one another, having a core of middle-class students sets a beneficial tone in each of these areas. Implementing Socioeconomic Integration Socioeconomic integration plans can be implemented in a number of different ways.