You asked (1) for a district-by-district breakdown of the number minority students attending magnet schools and (2) for urban and suburban districts, whether there is a disparity in each district's percentage of minority students attending magnet schools compared to its overall percentage of minority students.

SUMMARY

According to data provided by the State Department of Education (SDE), 13 districts host interdistrict magnet schools and 106 other districts send students to them. Eight of the host districts are urban and five are suburban. Twenty of the state's 27 magnet schools are located in urban districts. Magnet school enrollments range from 30 to 594 students. Statewide magnet school enrollment is 8,171 students. Of these 3,651 (45%) are white and 4,520 (55%) are minority (American Indian, Asian-American, Black, or Hispanic).

Participating districts vary widely both in the total number of students and the number of minority students they send to magnet schools. In general, the districts that host magnet schools have the largest numbers of total students and of minority students attending the schools. New Haven hosts the most interdistrict magnet schools (nine) and has the most students and minority students attending such schools. Only two districts that do not host magnet schools (West Haven and Windsor) rank among the top 10 districts in total magnet school enrollment.

To determine if disproportionate numbers of minority or nonminority students go to interdistrict magnet schools from particular districts or types of districts, we compared the percentage of minorities among the students from each district attending magnet schools, as reported by SDE, with the same district's overall percentage minority students as reported in its most recent strategic school profile. We eliminated from the comparison any district with fewer than 10 students attending magnet schools because percentage comparisons based on small numbers can be misleading.

The comparison shows disparities of more than five percentage points in 40 of 63 districts. The most common disparity in the suburban districts is a higher proportion of minority students in the magnet school group than in the district as a whole. In the urban districts, it is more common for the magnet school group to be less heavily minority than the district as a whole. But the range of disparities in the urban districts is smaller than that of the suburban districts.

The comparisons below use the most up-to-date district-wide minority percentages available, which are those from the 2000-01 strategic school profiles. This data is a year older than the magnet school data, which is from 2001-02. Since school districts do not typically experience big percentage increases or decreases in numbers of minority students in a single year, we do not believe the one-year discrepancy in data unduly affects the comparisons. Nevertheless, the figures below should be used with caution until they can be updated with 2001-02 district-wide minority percentages.

For your further information, we attach SDE's tables showing (1) each magnet school's total, white, and minority students and the number and percentage of its students coming from the host and sending districts (Attachment 1) and (2) the sex and racial breakdown of students from each participating town for each interdistrict magnet school (Attachments 2-29).

TOTAL AND MINORITY MAGNET SCHOOL ENROLLMENT BY DISTRICT

Table 1 below shows the total number of students and the number of minority students from each participating district enrolled in the state's 27 interdistrict magnet schools in October 2001. The table ranks districts according to total magnet school students. Magnet school host districts are shown in bold.

Table 1: Total and Minority Magnet School Enrollment

By District, October 2001

MINORITY ENROLLMENT COMPARISON

The tables below compare the percentage of minority students attending interdistrict magnet schools, by district, with each district's overall minority enrollment. Districts with fewer than 10 students attending magnet schools are excluded. (These districts are shown in Table 1 above. ) Table 2 shows comparisons for 12 urban districts and Table 3 shows comparisons for 51 suburban districts.

The final column of each table shows the percentage-point deviation in the proportion of minority magnet school students from the proportion of minority students in the district as a whole. A positive number means minority students make up a higher proportion of magnet school students than they do of the district's overall student population. A negative number means that minority students are a smaller proportion of magnet school students than of the district's overall student population. Districts are ranked in descending order from the district with the highest share of minority magnet school students relative to its overall minority student population to the district with the lowest share.

Table 2: Urban Districts With 10 Or More Students Attending Interdistrict Magnet Schools

Table 3: Suburban Districts With 10 Or More Students Attending Interdistrict Magnet Schools

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