A Model for a Magnet Program Which Promotes Both High Achievement and Voluntary Integration

Abstract

In order to provide high quality specialized instruction and to achieve voluntary integration, a magnet program was developoed in the Fort Worth (Texas) Independent School District.The program is in its third year. of implementation and currently is underway in two high schools, two middle schools, and an elementary school. Program features included use of uniform entry criteria for all races, preparation of students prior to entering a minority neighborhood school, business community involvement through adoption,utilization of results from other districts' definition of performance standards, and consistency abiding by them. Both number and quality of magnet program students have increased each year in the 1982-83 school year, students scored 2-3.9 years above district norms, and showed 1.5-2.5 months gain per month of instruction. Black students, whose numbers rise each year, scored lower and showed slightly smaller gains than_White students, but scored 3-4.8 years above district Black norms. Overall, ethnic enrollments in the magnet program include 6 percent Asian, 50 percent Black, 9 percent Hispanic, and 35 percent White. Program evaluation findings point toward the effectiveness of the magnet program, both as an environment of enhanced academic achievement and as a means of ethnic integration for the schools involved.