Prominent journalist, academic, and anti-racism activist Nikole Hannah-Jones recently wrote a controversial New York Times article, in which she expresses regret for her and her husband's decision to place her daughter in underperforming majority-Black public schools in New York City. Hannah-Jones hoped that putting her daughter there would help improve education for disadvantaged minority children, as her family's wealth and skills as political activists might stimulate reforms. Instead, her daughter ended up bitterly bemoaning the poor quality of the education she got, and Hannah-Jones' well-meaning efforts to improve the public schools she attended accomplished very little. Eventually, at her daughter's request, Hannah-Jones acknowledged error, and sent her daughter to a higher-quality selective high school.
Hannah-Jones' story is a testament to the value of exit rights and choice. Although she does not seem to recognize it, the best way to help students from less advantaged families than her own is to expand exit and choice opportunities for them. That is what social science shows. Her story also resonated with me because of my own experience as both a struggling student and (later) a parent. That experience also highlights the value of exit rights and choice, even if in a slightly different way.
