Opinion ID: 792253
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Need for race-based tiebreaker

Text: 91 When the District moved from its controlled choice plan to the current Plan, see supra Part I.A, it predicted that families would tend to choose schools close to their homes. Indeed, this feature was seen as a positive way to increase parental involvement. However, unfettered choice — especially with tiebreakers based on neighborhood or distance from a school — created the risk that Seattle's high school enrollment would again do no more than reflect its segregated housing patterns. See supra Part II.C.2. 92 It is this de facto residential segregation across a white/nonwhite axis that the District has battled historically and that it seeks to ameliorate by making the integration tiebreaker a part of its open choice Plan. 32 The District, mindful of both Seattle's history and future, appropriately places its focus here. In the 2001-02 school year, the integration tiebreaker operated in three high schools (that is, three high schools were oversubscribed and deviated by more than 15 percent from the ratio of white to nonwhite students district-wide). The integration tiebreaker served to alter the imbalance in the schools in which it operated in a minimally intrusive manner. The tiebreaker, therefore, successfully achieved the District's compelling interests. 93