Schools do not receive much recognition within urban sociological research for the role they perform in shaping the demographic, structural, and social features of neighborhoods, cities, and metropolitan areas. In contrast, this article links schools, and the racial avoidance that operates through educational policy, to the extreme economic…

States that the more research there is on a social problem the harder it is for policy-makers and courts to get the sort of guidance they often say they want: clear recommendations about what to do, or at least clear alternatives. Considers this conflict with regard to racial research and school integration. (Author/RK)

Advances the proposition that the emphasis on social science data in school desegregation litigation is misplaced; that the supporting basis for "Brown v. Board Of Education" was the equal protection clause; and that the use of social science in future school litigation should focus on how to improve desegregated educational programs…

Historical overview considers the role of transportation in education before 1954, when school busing was used to improve education by consolidating rural schools and centralize effort in urban schools, and after the 1954 Supreme Court decision that racially segregated schools were inherently unequal. Different attitudes toward forced busing are…