Jacob I. Stowell

School Segregation in Metropolitan Regions, 1970-2000: The Impacts of Policy Choices on Public Education.

It has been argued that the effects of the desegregation of public schools from the late 1960s onward were limited and short‐lived, in part because of white flight from desegregating districts and in part because legal decisions in the 1990s released many districts from court orders. Data presented here for 1970–2000 show that small increases in segregation between districts were outweighed by larger declines within districts. Progress was interrupted but not reversed after 1990. Desegregation was not limited to districts and metropolitan regions where enforcement actions required it, and factors such as private schooling, district size, and inclusion of both city and suburban areas within district boundaries had stronger effects than individual court mandates.

Incorporating Ethnic-Specific Measures of Immigration in the Study of Lethal Violence

The growing body of research on immigration and crime consistently finds that immigration, contrary to both criminological theory and popular sentiment, is not related to higher levels of lethal violence. Instead, a common finding in the literature is that immigration predicts lower levels of violence, and homicide in particular. The primary objective of the present study is an initial test of hypotheses associated with the Latino paradox, by focusing on the degree to which the impact of immigration operates differentially as a product of ethnicity. Using neighborhood-level homicide data and ethnically disaggregated indicators of immigration, these are consistent with the expectations of the Latino paradox.

Extending Immigration and Crime Studies National Implications and Local Settings

One of American society’s enduring debates centers on the immigration and violent crime relationship. This classic debate is revisited using data for individual homicide incidents and census-tract-level homicides in Miami, Florida, and San Antonio, Texas, in the 1980s and 1990s, respectively. The article starts with these two comparative cases because they mirror the immigration influx, Latino growth, and homicide decline seen throughout the country since 1980. These findings are also replicated in an analysis of the immigration and crime influx across the nation using U.S. counties in 2000. In sum, results from comparative cases, different time points, homicide motivations, and individual/community/national levels—and even controlling for Latino regional concentration—are reported. The findings were clear and unequivocal: more immigrants did not mean more homicide, and that outcome held across time and place.

The Impact of Neighborhood Context on Intragroup and Intergroup Robbery: The San Antonio Experience:

Guided by social disorganization theory, this article examines the influence of neighborhood characteristics on intragroup and intergroup robbery, net of spatial proximity in a predominantly native-born Latino/Mexican-origin city—San Antonio, Texas. From census tract and official police robbery data, the findings indicate that intragroup robbery is more common than intergroup robbery. Multivariate results show that variation in black intragroup robbery lies primarily in highly disadvantaged neighborhoods; whereas variation in Latino intergroup robbery is found in neighborhoods with more disadvantage, racial/ethnic heterogeneity, recent immigrants, and blacks. Residential instability persistently influences all robbery types. Disaggregating robberies by race and ethnicity reveals the importance of examining Latinos as offenders and victims. The case of San Antonio serves as a harbinger of conditions that may exist in the growing number of majority-Latino cities—and suggests the need to investigate crime experiences that move beyond studying racial dichotomies of violence.

The impact of desegregation on black teachers in the metropolis, 1970–2000

Abstract One-third of public school students are racial and/or ethnic minorities. Yet only 14 per cent of teachers represent these groups. Frequently lost in broader debates concerning this disparity is the paradoxical contribution of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision. Schools were mandated under Brown to desegregate the student body. But the law did not necessarily protect the jobs of black teachers and administrators. Using a unique database of court orders, we examine the impact of mandated desegregation on black teachers. Findings indicate regional differences. Mandated desegregation created conditions that resulted in decreases in the black teaching force in the South. The opposite occurred in the non-south, with mandated desegregation positively associated with increases (although small) in the black teaching force. Our findings suggest that the legacy of mandated desegregation may have created broader institutional conditions in which black and other minority teachers remain underrepresented in the teaching force.

Cognitive-behavioral programming and the value of failed interventions: A propensity score evaluation

ABSTRACT Recent scholarship suggests treatment effects from cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) based interventions can significantly reduce rates of prison misconduct. However, these findings may overestimate CBT treatment effects due to publication bias towards positive results and limitations of nonexperimental methodologies. This study used propensity score matching (PSM) to evaluate the effectiveness of a CBT-based substance abuse program in reducing misconduct at a northeastern correctional facility. Disciplinary outcomes were compared between program graduates (n = 156) and non-graduates (n = 482). Despite observable differences between groups before PSM, results indicated no significant treatment effects on misconduct after matching. Research and policy implications are discussed.

Local Context and National Consequences: Homicide Variations Across Time

National concern over the impact of immigration on crime reappeared in 1980 after “Mariel” Cuban refugees landed in southern Florida. This event eventually energized largely dormant anti-immigrant groups and commentators who soon claimed “Hispanic immigrants” threatened “American” society by avoiding assimilation and created national security issues, among other problems (Huntington, 2004; Portes & Stepick, 1993). Immigrant opponents had long focused primarily on the consequences of Mexican border crossers on local economies and crime in the southwestern United States. But, “Mariel” soon generated opposition to the Cuban exodus, galvanized nativists, and nationalized the immigration issue by drawing attention to large numbers of newcomers outside of the Rio Grande area (Huntington, 2004). Unfortunately the immigrant/crime connection was not seriously considered throughout most of the 1980s, and the relevance of studying the effects of immigration on crime was not apparent until recent demographic transformations sparked research in this area.