So far, Portland and its urban school district seem healthy, but that could change if Portlanders give up on their public schools, Rusk says. Meanwhile, enrollment in Portland Public Schools remains the highest of any urban school district in the nation, with 92 percent of children in the district attending the public schools. If private school isn't an option, many parents simply move to the suburbs. In the Detroit region, for example, only about 20 percent of school-age children live inside the city limits. In Portland, the figure is nearly twice that.
Urban flight spells trouble at city schools for a variety of reasons.
On a more practical note, when middle-class parents move to Beaverton, they take with them a chunk of the school district's tax base, and of the city's as well, Rusk says. Again, Portland's numbers look fairly good, at least for now. Compare that to Detroit, where 23 percent of the population lives within city limits, but only 7 percent of the metro region's tax base is found there. In other words, keeping up the public schools keeps up property values. Metro's director of growth management, John Fregonese, agrees that quality schools are an important component of controlling suburban sprawl, even though two-thirds of the city's residents don't have children in the public schools.