Marketing Schools, Marketing Cities: Who Wins and Who Loses When Schools Become Urban Amenities

by Maia Bloomfield Cucchiara

Discuss real estate with any young family and the subject of schools is certain to come up—in fact, it will likely be a crucial factor in determining where that family lives. Not merely institutions of learning, schools have increasingly become a sign of a neighborhood’s vitality, and city planners have ever more explicitly promoted “good schools” as a means of attracting more affluent families to urban areas, a dynamic process that Maia Bloomfield Cucchiara critically examines in Marketing Schools, Marketing Cities .

 

Focusing on Philadelphia’s Center City Schools Initiative, she shows how education policy makes overt attempts to prevent, or at least slow, middle-class flight to the suburbs. Navigating complex ethical terrain, she balances the successes of such policies in strengthening urban schools and communities against the inherent social injustices they propagate—the further marginalization and disempowerment of lowerclass families. By asking what happens when affluent parents become “valued customers,” Marketing Schools, Marketing Cities uncovers a problematic relationship between public institutions and private markets, where the former are used to leverage the latter to effect urban transformations.

Genres: Education, Grad School, Nonfiction

297 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Lydia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well-written and easy to read for anyone who is interested in the topic.

[PatriceReads · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wish race and structural racism was more thoroughly discussed in this book.

[ebbl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read on educational equity, urban “revitalization,” and class analysis of policy. Tells the story of a divided school community and the divided city that created it, weaving compelling narrative and decisive analysis. Could use more reflection on the author’s positionality as a professional class white woman.

[jennifer]

I deeply appreciated the commitments at the heart of this book.