Two University of Illinois at Chicago professors contend in a study that the "miracle" of reform of Chicago Public Schools under Mayor Daley instead widened the gap between white, African American, and Hispanic students and created a "two-tier" public school system. more ›

(Ed. Note: Art sent the photos for this week's post last Thursday, two days before the events in Arizona. Discussing plans for future posts over the phone yesterday, we agreed that these photos should still run, at the very least, to show that some of the things we face as Americans are the same now as they were back when these photos were shot. — CS) more ›

Early census data that's now starting to come to light shows that integration of America's neighborhoods is regressing slightly. As for Chicago? Well, we're still hyper-segregated. more ›

Inspired by Bill Rankin's map of Chicago that laid out the city's racial and ethnic dividing lines, photographer Eric Fischer wanted to see what other cities looked like when mapped the same way (Fischer previously geo-tagged the entire city). Last week, Fischer shared the findings via his Flickr page, also making his own map of Chicago. Both Rankin's and Fischer's maps use data from the 2000 Census, with Fischer matching his map to Rankin's key in which each dot represents 25 people: Red = White, Blue = Black, Green = Asian, Orange = Hispanic. Rankin's maps, created in 2009, also map out race and income. more ›

A new study led by a UIC researcher - performed in conjunction with the University of Michigan - shows that "racial residential segregation in the Chicago area may be perpetuated by a lack of knowledge of communities across racial lines." In 2005, researchers surveyed more than 700 adults 21 years of age and older living in Cook County, Illinois to examine how whites, blacks and Latinos differ in awareness of neighborhoods in Chicago and surrounding areas. Respondents in the study were asked to look at a map which highlighted 41 communities located in and around the city and mark any area they didn’t know anything about. The researchers called these areas community blind spots. The 41 areas represented a variety of communities in and outside the city - from communities with expensive housing to those with moderately priced housing, and from communities that are racially segregated to those that are integrated. Regardless of the variety and types of communities represented, the blind spot communities were very different along racial lines. more ›

Photo by trippchicago