Primary Submission Category: Non-health institutions (business, political, education systems)
The Spatial Distribution of School Environment Indicators in New York State and Co-Patterning with Sociodemographic Characteristics
Authors: Lisa Frueh, Ellen Kinnee, Perry Sheffield, Jane Clougherty,
Presenting Author: Lisa Frueh*
Children aged 5-18 in the United States spend around 20% of their time in school, and school context is a key determinant of child health. We compiled publicly-available data on public school educational, social, and building environment in New York State (NYS), to investigate spatial clustering across these domains, and co-patterning with neighborhood sociodemographic characteristics. A suite of school educational, social, and physical indicators were compiled for public schools across 2005-2019 in NYS. Spatial regression models were used to estimate bivariate spatial associations between census tract-level sociodemographic characteristics and school quality indicators.
Results suggest that schools with better educational and physical environments are more often found in census tracts with larger non-Hispanic White populations and higher socioeconomic position. For example, in preliminary non-spatial regression models in 2015, a 1-percent increase in census tract population of color was associated with 3% lower odds that > 90% classes in the school are taught by a highly-qualified teacher [OR = 0.97 (95%CI: 0.96, 0.97)]. Similarly, a 1-percent increase in the rent-burdened population (spending > 30% of income on rent) was associated with 2% lower odds that > 90% classes in the school are taught by a highly-qualified teacher [OR = 0.98 (0.97, 0.99)]. Building quality indicators showed comparable patterns—for example, higher rent burdened population was associated with higher odds of receiving negative ratings for space adequacy, ventilation, or overall building rating, and higher odds of evidence of vermin.
Schools with poorer building quality, more crowding, and lower teacher qualifications are more likely to be found in census tracts of lower socioeconomic position and a greater proportion of people of color. These results highlight racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic disparities in access to high-quality public schools in NYS.