USSCHOOLS
Desegregation court cases and school demographic data
Click here to enter the map.
Map US Schools is part of the American Communities Project of Brown University, led by John Logan. Its purpose is to provide information about public schools across the United States, including maps of school district boundaries and locations of individual schools. These maps provide information such as which districts have higher or lower poverty rates, racial diversity, or disparities across schools, and which schools have better or worse performance on standardized tests. (On the map, performance is indicated by colors of the school icons, identifying schools in the top 20% or bottom 20% of their state.)
When you open the system, you will see a map of the continental U.S.
- Zoom in or out with your mouse or the +/- tool. Type a street address or place name, even a landmark, in the box on the bottom right corner to go directly to that location.
- By default you will be shown a street map. You can change it to satellite imagery or a light gray canvas by clicking on “Select a Base Map.”
- To visualize school district data for elementary grades, click on the symbol
in the upper left corner. This opens a box in which you can choose a category of variables and then a specific variable. (Population data are from the census; “kids” data refer to the enrolled students.) You can also drag the slider to choose between 2000 and 2010 data. (You can then close this box or reopen it to see the legend.) - The selected variable will be displayed (you may need to adjust the zoom level to see district boundaries). If Click on a district to see its exact value on the variable that is displayed.
- You can also show the location of schools (coded by color and shape to reflect their grade level and test performance). An important tool along the top border – Identify School -- allows you to see detailed information on individual schools. Select this tool and then click on a school location. A pop-up window will appear with school information (be sure to disable your pop-up blocker for this site).
- Other tools along the top border to print the map as displayed, and to select an area using your mouse (click on points to identify the outline of the area, double click at the end to close the polygon). “Download” provides the data for the selected area in a new window.
Click here to enter the map.