A Seattle Times analysis found that Seattle Public Schools were most integrated in the 1980s and ‘90s, before the district reversed course and stopped busing students for integration. The analysis used a formula called the dissimilarity index, a popular way that researchers represent segregation. Values closer to zero mean that schools’ demographics were more similar to the district’s as a whole at that time. Values closer to 1 represent higher segregation.
Key events
1 1978: Beginning of mandatory integration across all Seattle schools
2 1989: SPS scales back mandatory busing program
3 1998: End of mandatory busing for racial integration
4 2000: Parents sue over racial tiebreaker
5 2002: Federal court injunction halts racial tiebreaker
6 2007: U.S. Supreme Court rules against SPS in tiebreaker case
