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High Expectations

America's Private Public Schools

Michael J. PetrilliJanie Scull
10.21.2011
10.21.2011

This analysis by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute finds that more than 1.7 million American children attend what we've dubbed "private public schools"—public schools that serve virtually no poor students.* In some metropolitan areas, as many as one in six public-school students—and one in four white youngsters—attends such schools, of which the U.S. has about 2,800. Read on to see whether there's one in your neighborhood.

* It has come to our attention that South Dakota reported inaccurate free-and-reduced-price-lunch data to the National Center for Education Statistics’ Common Core of Data, impacting our results for the Mt. Rushmore State.

Press release

"Private public schools" broken down by metro area

NATIONWIDE

Atlanta

Baltimore

Boston

Chicago

Cincinnati

Dallas

Denver

Detroit

Houston

Inland Empire

Los Angeles

Miami

Minneapolis

New York

Philadelphia

Phoenix

Pittsburgh

Portland

Sacramento

San Diego

San Francisco

Seattle

St. Louis

Tampa

Washington DC


Policy Priority:
High Expectations
Topics:
Governance
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Michael J. Petrilli is president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, executive editor of Education Next, and a Distinguished Senior Fellow for Education Commission of the States. An award-winning writer…

View Full Bio
Janie Scull

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