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Segregation by choice? A study of group-specific reasons for

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Journal of Education Policy
Vol. 20, No. 3, May 2005, pp. 347–368

Segregation by choice? A study of

group-specific reasons for school choice
Eddie Denessena*, Geert Driessenaa and Peter Sleegersb
a b
Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands; University of Amsterdam, The
Netherlands
30EddieDenessen
Department
000002005
Journal
10.1080/02680930500108981
TEDP110881.sgm
0268-0939
Original
Taylor
2005
20 &
and of Educational
ofArticle
Francis
Education
(print)/1464-5106
FrancisLtd PolicySciencesRadboud
Ltd (online) University NijmegenPO Box 9104Nijmegen6500 HEThe NetherlandsE.Denessen@pwo.ru.nl

In this paper, patterns of group-specific reasons for school choice and their implications for segre-
gation within the Dutch educational system are examined. The data from more than 10,000
parents are considered in analyses of variance. Parental reasons for school choice are found to
relate to religion, social milieu and ethnicity, on the one hand, and the school’s denomination,
social milieu and ethnic composition, on the other hand. The results show general quality of
education to be a leading reason for school choice while group-specific reasons for school choice
also exist with Muslim migrant parents, in particular, showing a strong preference for an Islamic
education for their children. The results thus suggest a risk of self-segregation among Muslim
migrant parents.

Introduction
In the past decades, freedom of school choice has been placed on the political agenda
in a number of western countries (Centre for Educational Research and Innovation,
1994; Glenn & De Groof 2002). Two widespread influences have contributed to this.
One is a neoliberal market-oriented view of educational provision. The other is the
desire on the part of a growing number of parents to make their own decisions with
regard to school choice. While freedom of school choice is said to improve the quality
of education as well as the level of parental involvement in the school a child attends,
many studies show freedom of school choice to also lead to segregation along group-
specific patterns of choice (see Karsten, 1994; Bagley, 1996; Goldhaber, 2000). In
the present study, parental reasons for school choice and the impact of such on educa-
tional segregation will therefore be examined in greater detail.

*Corresponding author. Department of Educational Sciences, Radboud University Nijmegen, PO

Box 9104, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlands. Email: E.Denessen@pwo.ru.nl

ISSN 0268–0939 (print)/ISSN 1464–5106 (online)/05/030347–22

© 2005 Taylor & Francis Group Ltd
DOI: 10.1080/02680930500108981
348 E. Denessen et al.

Neoliberal reforms and increased freedom of school choice

From a market perspective, freedom of school choice is clearly preferred over
restricted school choice. Freedom of school choice enhances competition among
schools. That is, increased pupil enrolment is needed to survive in a free educational
market, and increased educational quality is thus needed to meet the motivation of
parents to choose the best school for their child (Bagley, 1996; Whitty & Edwards,
1998; Gorard, 1999; Goldhaber, 2000). It is assumed that the enrolments of poorly
performing schools will drop in favour of better performing schools because parents
are willing to transfer their children to better performing schools. In addition, compe-
tition for pupils is assumed to force schools to improve the quality of their education
in order to maintain their enrolments and attract new pupils (McArthur et al., 1995).
While little empirical evidence shows freedom of school choice to actually contribute
to better pupil achievement (Holmes et al., 2003), many countries have nevertheless
started to embrace a policy of increased freedom of school choice.
For the involvement of parents in the educational market, greater freedom of
school choice is also assumed to be of critical importance. In the US, the growing
number of vouchers and charter schools can be seen to be creating a system of schools
to accommodate parental preferences (Wells et al., 1999; Gill et al., 2001). In addi-
tion, increased educational diversity has been justified ‘with enthusiastic reference to
the good examples set by the Netherlands and Denmark, as a proper response to the
aspirations of minority groups to contain their children’s schooling within their own
cultural or religious frame of reference’ (Whitty & Edwards, 1998, p. 213).

Possible negative effects of freedom of choice

From a sociological perspective, the increased freedom of school choice is being
followed rather critically. Increased freedom of school choice can be associated with
increased educational differentiation, which can—in turn—have very negative conse-
quences for underprivileged groups in particular (Bagley, 1996; Ball et al., 1996;
Woods, 1996; Gillborn, 1997; Tomlinson, 1997; Goldhaber & Eide, 2002). In the
US, for example, numerous charter schools are being founded by parents with suffi-
cient financial and cultural resources (Wells et al., 1999). But in accordance with the
work of Bourdieu (1986) and Coleman (1988), such a system of educational freedom
can clearly and actively contribute to educational inequality: ‘Where most recent
analyses of class differentiation in education have stressed the work of selection and
allocation done by schools and teachers, here selection and differentiation are
produced, in part at least, by the actions of families’ (Ball et al., 1996, p. 110). In a
market-based system of school choice, educational inequality can increase when
parents from certain backgrounds are found to make group-specific choices. Greater
economic, racial and ethnic stratification within the educational system and thereby
greater social segregation is presumed to occur (Ball et al., 1996; Goldhaber, 2000).
And such expressions as ‘white flight’ (i.e., the choice of white parents for schools
with a predominantly white population) clearly refer to this mechanism (Bagley,
 Segregation by choice? 349

1996). In some countries, moreover, recognition of this segregation risk has

prompted very careful formulation of policy regarding unlimited freedom of school
choice (see Rinne et al., 2002).
The extent to which such negative effects actually occur has yet to be clearly empir-
ically studied. According to Gillborn (1997) and Tomlinson (1997), the policy devel-
opments in such countries as the UK and the Netherlands can be seen to lead to the
marketization of schooling, decentralization and deregulation of schooling, increased
school autonomy, the publication of school performances and increased competition
among schools to the detriment of ethnic minorities in inner-city schools and only
increased social and racial segregation as a result. In contrast, Goldhaber and Eide
(2002) argue that both the positive and negative consequences of freedom of school
choice on pupil performance have yet to be empirically confirmed or disconfirmed
and conclude that, in the absence of any clear effects, increased freedom of school
choice is not the answer to the educational problems confronting major cities. When
Gorard et al. (2002) conducted research on the assumption that the school rolls of
unpopular schools will decrease and the number of disadvantaged pupils attending
unpopular schools will increase in a free market situation using all of the secondary
schools in the UK from 1989 to 1999, they did not find any proof for their assump-
tion and concluded that there is no need to fear a spiral of school decline as a result
of increased freedom of school choice.
More recently, Gorard et al. (2003) have studied segregation effects of increased
freedom of choice in the UK since the Education Reform Act 1988. Local analyses
of segregation between 1989 and 2000 at an authority level showed that segregation
between secondary schools did not increase as a result of marketization. Gorard et al.
also pointed at differences in outcomes of small scale research and large scale research
suggesting that results of small-scale research, in which segregation effects have been
reported, may be biased by the socio-economic and demographic changes in society
rather than changes in school admissions. Gorard et al. argue that local studies of
segregation effects might yield different results as they show LEA-specific differences
in segregation effects since 1988.
In this study, we will look at parents’ reasons for school choice in the Netherlands,
where the system of choice differs from the British and US systems.

Obligatory school choice in the Netherlands: a specific context of choice

The school choice situation in the Netherlands differs from many other countries. In
the Netherlands, there is a total freedom of school choice. Actually, choice is obliga-
tory. Children are not assigned to a local school, all parents have to make a choice.
No catchment areas exist and there is a wide variety of schools. Public and denomi-
national schools receive equivalent central funding. In the Netherlands, the number
of denominational schools is quite large (approximately 70% of the total number of
primary schools, mostly of Catholic and Protestant signature). Despite increasing
levels of secularization in the Netherlands, these numbers have stayed unchanged over
the past decades. The large numbers of denominational schools in an increasingly
350 E. Denessen et al.

secularizing society implies that parents choose denominational schools for non-
religious reasons (Dijkstra et al., 1997). Moreover, for reasons of convenience, the
quality of education or reputation, non-religious parents may even choose a religious
school for their child. In the 1980s Muslim parents have claimed the right of founding
governmentally funded religious schools. Since then, more than 40 Islamic schools
have been founded.
The specific character of the Dutch educational system makes it rather difficult to
infer findings of research in other countries to the Netherlands. For example, designs
of British research on differences between choosers and non-choosers (see Willms &
Echols, 1992) are not apt for research on reasons for school choice in the Netherlands,
due to the obligatory nature of school choice in the Netherlands.

Research objective
The effects of freedom of school choice on the quality of education and possible segre-
gation within the educational system are as yet unclear. In the present study, parental
reasons for school choice are therefore examined in connection with the characteristics
of the schools themselves. More specifically, the following questions are addressed.
● What reasons do parents have for school choice?
● To what extent can differences in parental reasons for school choice be explained
by group-specific characteristics and school characteristics?

General reasons for school choice

On the basis of previous research on school choice, several factors have been found
to play a role in the choice of school (Hunter, 1991; Morgan et al., 1993; Hughes et al.,
1994; Echols & Willms 1995; Hammond & Dennison 1995). In their research on
parental choice, Hughes et al. (1994) found locality to be mentioned as a reason for
the choice of school by 56% of a sample of 138 parents and reputation by 46% of the
parents. Locality refers to such considerations as convenience but also to the extent
to which the school is viewed as part of the local community. Reputation refers to such
issues as the care for the children and the quality of the education (Hughes et al., 1994).
For her research on school choice, Hunter (1991) interviewed 300 parents and found
discipline, good exam results and proximity to home to be the most important reasons
for selection of a school. Of less importance were the denomination of the school,
caring teachers and special emphasis on the practical area of curriculum. In yet another
study of the reasons for school choice, Echols and Willms (1995) investigated the
motives of 290 parents to choose a non-local school for their child to attend and found
the preferences of the child, a well-disciplined school climate and good pupil behaviour
to be critical motives. Morgan et al. (1993) found the quality of the education and the
geographical nearness of the school to be important reasons for the selection of a
particular school. Hammond and Dennison (1995) interviewed 725 parents and
found teacher quality, examination results, discipline and school reputation to be the
most important reasons.
 Segregation by choice? 351

In the Netherlands, considerable research has been conducted on the reasons for
school choice with an eye to mostly the formulation of local educational policy and
the founding of new schools. The Dutch government states that insight into parental
preferences should be taken into account with respect to the establishment of new
schools (Van Kessel, 2000). And in the relevant studies, the most frequently
mentioned reasons for school choice have been found to be as follows: religious
affiliation, quality of the education, child-rearing values and home-school distance
(Boef-Van der Meulen & Herweijer, 1992). More recently, the ethnic composition of
the school population has also been found to be a reason for school choice (Van der
Wouw, 1994).
The aforementioned reasons for school choice can be reduced to four general
domains (see also Taylor, 2001). Parents can have ideological (i.e., religious and/or
pedagogical) reasons for choosing a particular school. The geographical distance of the
school from home or work can play a role. The quality of the education can certainly be
a reason for the choice of a particular school. And certain non-educational characteristics
of the school, such as the characteristics of the school population, can be of importance.
Parents’ reasons for school choice can be seen as an indicator for their views on the
type of schools they would preferably choose for their child. However, the provision
of schools may not meet parents’ reasons for school choice. For example, when
Catholic parents would prefer a Catholic school for their child and no Catholic school
is available, these parents can not make a choice that is driven by their leading reason
for choice. The provision of schools (or the lack of provision of specific types of
schools) may lead to a discongruence between parents’ reasons for school choice and
their factual choice of a school (Teelken, 1998).

Group-specific reasons for school choice

When parents from different backgrounds are found to choose a school for group-
specific reasons, segregation may be the case. Little research has been conducted on
the group-specific reasons for choice of school, but inspection of the relevant interna-
tional literature shows two characteristics to possibly influence the choice of school
by parents, namely social class (or social milieu) and ethnicity.
The reasons for the selection of a particular school appear to be strongly related to
the social class of the parents involved. When Ball et al. (1996; also see Bowe et al.,
1994a, b; Gewirtz et al., 1995) interviewed 137 parents, they found that three types
of school choosers could be distinguished: ‘privileged/skilled’, ‘semi-skilled’ and
‘disconnected’. The term ‘skilled’ refers to the capacities of parents to operate on the
educational market. According to Bourdieu (1986) and Coleman (1988), the skilled
chooser has the social and cultural capital needed to access school information and
compare schools with respect to the those characteristics they consider important.
Stated differently: the capacity to access and use school information constitutes
cultural and social capital.
Privileged/skilled choosers strongly prefer a school which suits the particular inter-
ests and personality of their child. Depending on their specific attitudes towards
352 E. Denessen et al.

education, privileged/skilled choosers may also select a school for its high quality
of education, high standards of academic achievement or strong emphasis on social
education. Semi-skilled choosers tend to select ‘good’ schools, with their choice based
strongly on the school’s reputation. Disconnected choosers typically choose a school
with a close physical proximity to their home and schools which are a part of the social
community (Ball et al., 1996). When the social class of parents is taken into account
‘… almost without exception the disconnected choosers are working class; the
privileged/skilled choosers are almost exclusively professional, middle class … the
semi-skilled choosers tend to be from a variety of class backgrounds’ (Ball et al., 1996,
p. 92).
Other research has also shown the reasons for school choice to be clearly related to
social milieu (Van der Kley & Felling, 1989; Echols & Willms, 1995; McArthur et al.,
1995). The findings of these studies are quite similar: low educated parents and work-
ing class parents tend to choose a school for physical proximity whereas high educated
parents and professional and middle class parents tend to choose that school which
best fits their child’s interests and personality. And it can therefore be expected that
high educated parents as well as professional and middle class parents rate educa-
tional or ideological reasons for school choice higher than low educated and lower
class parents.
Research on school choice in the UK also shows ethnic composition to play a role
in parental choice of school (Bagley, 1996, p. 578): ‘… in 1994 almost a third of white
parental interviewees cited the presence of Asian children in a school as a major factor
influencing their choice of school’. In the Netherlands, in contrast, the ethnic compo-
sition of a school appears to play only a minor role in the process of school choice
(Van Breenen et al., 1991; Van der Wouw, 1994). There is, however, some evidence
for the existence of both ‘white flight’ and ‘black flight’ within systems with freedom
of school choice. And in the present study, we will therefore address the issue of
school characteristics in relation to parental reasons for school choice in greater
detail.
Insight into parental reasons for school choice and any group-specific reasons for
school choice can help us understand the role of such in school segregation. In addi-
tion, such insight can help us understand how freedom of school choice affects the
composition of school populations.

Method
Sample, instruments and response
The data analyzed in this study come from the Dutch cohort study entitled ‘Primary
education’ (PRIMA). As part of this research project, data have been collected on
primary-school pupils, their parents, their teachers and the relevant school adminis-
trators every two years since the 1994–1995 school year with the aid of tests and
questionnaires. The project has involved a total of 700 primary schools, which is
almost 10% of the total number of Dutch primary schools, and some 60,000 Grade
 Segregation by choice? 353

2, 4, 6 and 8 pupils (i.e., 6-, 8-, 10- and 12-year-olds). The PRIMA project is
characterized by an overrepresentation of schools with a relatively large number of
pupils with a lower social economic status and/or ethnic minority status, which
makes it possible to reliably estimate the systematic effects of factors pertaining to
social milieu and ethnicity. For the present analyses, the results from the third
PRIMA measurement conducted during the 1998–1999 school year have been used
(Driessen et al., 2000).
The data on which the present analyses are based were gathered using two instru-
ments: a written questionnaire for the parents of pupils attending Grade 2 (i.e., 6-
year-olds) and a written questionnaire for the relevant school administrators.
The parent questionnaire contains questions regarding parental background (i.e.,
level of education, ethnicity), religion and reasons for the choice of school for their
child.1 The school questionnaire contains questions regarding the religious identity
of the school. The social milieu and ethnic composition of the school population was
computed by aggregating the individual pupil data with regard to social milieu and
ethnicity.
The response rates for the written questionnaires were 68% for the parents and
100% for the school administrators. The parental response rate was slightly biased
with a response rate of 75% for those parents with a high level of education versus a
response rate of 56% for immigrant parents with a lower level of education,2 and this
despite the fact that both Turkish and Moroccan instructions were included with the
parent questionnaire and the fact that the parents could request assistance from the
school for completion of the questionnaire (Driessen et al., 2000). Given our interest
in the reasons for school choice in relation to school characteristics and not the repre-
sentativeness of the parent population in the present study, such a response bias does
not constitute a problem (Zetterberg, 1963; Gijsberts, 1993).
In the end, information from the parents of 11,362 pupils and 573 schools was
gathered.

Variables
Social milieu. Highest level of education completed by the mother or father was
taken to be an indicator of social milieu. Seven levels, ranging from (1) completion of
primary school to (7) completion of university, were distinguished.

Ethnicity. Country of birth for the parents was taken to be an indicator of ethnicity,
and the following dichotomy was thus possible: (1) both parents born in the Nether-
lands; (2) at least one parent born in a foreign country.

Religion. Religion of the mother was generally taken to be an indicator of religion,

with the obvious exception of father-only families. Five categories of religion were
distinguished: (1) no religion; (2) Protestant; (3) Catholic; (4) Islamic; or (5) other
religions.
354 E. Denessen et al.

Reasons for school choice. The parents were presented 17 possible reasons for the
choice of school for their child and asked to rate the importance of each reason along
a scale ranging from (1) not important at all to (5) very important. These reasons were
drawn from previous studies of school choice. For the complete list of reasons, see
Table 1.

Denomination.3. The denomination of the school was categorized as one of the

following five types: (1) non-religious; (2) Protestant; (3) Catholic; (4) Islamic; or (5)
other.

Composition. Based on the background characteristics of the parents of the pupils

within the schools, two school-composition variables could be distinguished: social
milieu (indicated by the level of parental education) and ethnicity. The composition
of a school in terms of social milieu could range from (1) schools with at least 50%
children of parents with no more than a junior secondary vocational education; (2)
schools with at least 50% children of parents with a senior secondary education; (3)
schools with at least 50% children of parents with a higher vocational or university
education; or (4) schools with a heterogeneous school population. Ethnic composi-
tion of a school was characterized as: (1) schools with over 50% immigrant children
or (2) schools with at least 50% native Dutch children.

Table 1. Descriptive statistics for 17 possible reasons for school choice

Reason for school choice n Mean SD Rank

School climate 10,471 4.10 0.83 2

Social background of most of the pupils 10,198 3.15 1.10 11
No other school available 9792 2.17 1.36 17
Order and discipline 10,282 4.02 0.82 4
Reputation of the school 10,245 3.74 0.95 7
Pupils attending this school get ahead in society 9945 3.34 1.17 9
School pays attention to each child 10,183 4.05 0.87 3
Other parents are our kind of people 10,003 2.64 1.18 15
Extra-curricular activities 9972 2.65 1.11 14
Denomination of the school (e.g., Catholic, non- 10,314 3.18 1.31 10
religious, Islamic)
School is within easy reach 10,468 3.84 1.04 5
Possibility to come in contact with other cultures 10,097 2.60 1.14 16
Quality of education 10,417 4.40 0.73 1
Attractive school building 10,126 3.38 1.04 8
Advice of friends 10,143 2.90 1.15 13
Class size 10,196 3.80 0.97 6
School is considerate of our religion 10,315 2.93 1.42 12
 Segregation by choice? 355

Analyses
To answer the research questions, three types of analyses were performed. First, the
descriptive statistics for each of the 17 possible reasons for choice of a particular school
were calculated in order to assess the importance of the reasons. In addition, the inter-
correlations between the reasons for the choice of a particular school were calculated
in order to investigate the interrelatedness of the reasons for school choice. Second,
the extent to which the importance of the various reasons for school choice was found
to differ with respect to the background characteristics of the parents and the different
school populations was examined. One-way analyses of variance were performed to
assess the influence of the parental background variables and school composition vari-
ables on the ratings of importance for the school-choice reasons. One can expect, for
instance, Catholic, Protestant or Muslim parents to rate ‘religion’ as an important
reason for school choice. A third set of analyses was undertaken to assess the extent
to which parents whose background is congruent with the characteristics of the school
being attended by their child tend to rate certain reasons for school choice as more
(or less) important than parents whose background is not congruent with the charac-
teristics of the school being attended by their child. One can expect, for instance,
Catholic parents who have chosen a Catholic school for their child to rate ‘religion’
as a more important reason for school choice than Catholic parents who have chosen
a non-Catholic school for their child or non-Catholic parents who have chosen a
Catholic school for their child. Analyses of variance with parental background
characteristics (i.e., religion, social milieu, ethnicity) and school characteristics (i.e.,
denomination, social milieu composition, ethnic composition) as the independent
variables and ratings of the different reasons for school choice as the dependent
variables were thus performed to reveal the relevant interactions between parental
background variables and school characteristics.

Results
Descriptive statistics for the importance ratings for the 17 reasons for the choice of
school are presented in Table 1. The mean scores show ‘quality of education’ to be
the most important reason. ‘School climate’ and ‘the school pays attention to each
child’ were also rated highly. The least important reasons were ‘there was no other
school available’, ‘the possibility to come in contact with other cultures’ and ‘the
other parents are our kind of people’.
School quality is reported to play a bigger role in the process of choosing a school
for one’s child than school composition. A negative choice (e.g., ‘no other school was
available’) is rarely made.
The intercorrelations between the ratings of the 17 reasons for school choice are
presented in Table 2. As can be seen, ‘quality of education’, ‘school climate’ and
‘school pays attention to each child’ were positively interrelated and also correlated
positively with ‘order and discipline’, ‘pupils attending this school get ahead in soci-
ety’, ‘an attractive school building’, ‘class size’ and ‘reputation of the school’. These
 Table 2. Correlations between 17 reasons for school choice (only correlations > 0.30 are shown)

Ahead in Class Social

356 E. Denessen et al.

Quality Climate Order Attention society Building size Reputation class Denomination

Quality of education
School climate 0.49
Order and discipline 0.52 0.48
Attention to each child 0.54 0.47 0.48
Get ahead in society 0.33 0.39 0.37
Attractive school 0.37 0.32 0.31 0.31
building
Class size 0.46 0.34 0.38 0.45 0.45
Extra-curricular 0.35 0.31
activities
Reputation 0.45 0.38 0.51 0.36 0.45 0.32 0.31
Social class of pupils 0.32 0.31
Our kind of people 0.30 0.44
Considerate of our 0.51
religion
 Segregation by choice? 357

positive correlations suggest a relation between issues of educational quality and a

school’s infrastructure. No relations were found between ratings of the importance of
educational quality and ratings related to school composition, religion or the distance
between home and school.
The two reasons for school choice based on characteristics of the school population
(i.e., ‘the social background of most of the pupils’ and ‘the other parents are our kind
of people’) were found to correlate positively with each other. The same holds for the
two reasons pertaining to parent and school religion (i.e., ‘the school is considerate of
our religion’ and ‘denomination of the school’). Such reasons for school choice as ‘the
school is within easy reach’ did not correlate with any of the other reasons for school
choice. The absence of relevant associations between many of the reasons for school
choice suggests that different and clearly distinct sets of reasons can motivate the
choice of a particular school for one’s child.

Parental background
Analyses of variance were next conducted on each of the 17 reasons for school
choice to assess the impact of parental background characteristics. More specifically,
the effects of the parents’ religion, educational level and ethnicity were assessed
successively.
Religion of the parents was found to influence three of the 17 reasons for school
choice (see Table 3).4 Denomination of the school was rated more important by the
Protestant parents than by the parents from the other religious groups while non-
religious parents rated this reason for school choice least important of the groups.
Muslim parents rated ‘the possibility to come into contact with other cultures’ as a
more important reason for school choice than the other parents while the Protestant
parents rated this reason least important. Muslim parents also rated ‘the school is
considerate of our religion’ as a more important reason for school choice than the
other parents. Not surprisingly, the group of non-religious parents rated this reason
rather unimportant. It should be noted that the reasons for school choice that have

Table 3. Mean scores showing relevant differences between religious groups on reasons for
school choice

Religion of parents

No religion Protestant Catholic Islamic Other

Reason for school choice n=3164 n=2155 n=3456 n=1933 n=394 R2

Denomination of the school 2.79 3.80 3.10 3.27 3.13 0.07

Possibility to come in contact 2.52 2.26 2.46 3.42 2.81 0.10
with other cultures
School is considerate of our 1.91 3.63 2.76 4.13 3.23 0.32
religion
358 E. Denessen et al.

been found to differ between religious groups have been rated relatively low,
compared to other reasons (see Table 1). For each religious group, the quality of
education remains the most important reason for school choice.
Parental level of education produced no relevant differences in the ratings of reasons
for school choice, which indicates that no social milieu differences could be identified
with respect to reasons for school choice.
With regard to ethnicity or native Dutch versus immigrant parents, the analyses of
variance revealed relevant differences on two reasons for school choice (see Table 4).
The mean scores show immigrant parents to rate ‘the possibility to come into
contact with other cultures’ as a more important reason for school choice than native
Dutch parents. The same holds for ‘the school is considerate of our religion’. These
results resemble the results for religion and reflect the fact that most of the immigrant
parents (59.2%) were Muslim (relative to 0.1% of the native Dutch parents). And the
results for religion and ethnicity may thus be confounded.

School characteristics
In the next set of analyses, the effects of school denomination, social milieu compo-
sition of the school and ethnic composition of the school on the ratings of importance
for the reasons for school choice were examined.
The ratings provided by the parents of the children attending schools of different
denominations differed on the same reasons for school choice as for religion (see Table
5). Three reasons were rated highest by the Muslim parents: ‘the denomination of the
school’, ‘the possibility to come into contact with other cultures’ and ‘the school is
considerate of our religion’. In contrast, parents sending their child to a Catholic
school rated ‘denomination of the school’ as less important than other parents (even
less important than parents sending their child to a non-religious school).
No differences between the ratings of reasons for school choice were found for the
parents sending their children to schools with differing social milieu compositions.
These results show the reasons for school choice to not lead to group-specific selec-
tion of schools by pupils from predominantly high versus low social milieus.
With respect to the ratings of the reasons for school choice by parents sending their
children to schools with different ethnic compositions, relevant differences were found

Table 4. Mean scores showing relevant differences between native Dutch and immigrant parents
on reasons for school choice

Ethnicity

Native Dutch Immigrant

Reason for school choice n=7304 n=2781 R2

Possibility of coming into contact with other cultures 2.4 3.2 0.10
The school is considerate of our religion 2.7 3.6 0.08
 Segregation by choice? 359

Table 5. Mean ratings of importance for reasons for school choice provided by parents sending
children to different denomination schools

Denomination of the school

Non- Protestant Catholic Islamic Other

Reason for school choice religious n=2856 n=4463 n=225 n=495 R2
n=3323

Denomination of the school 3.11 3.50 2.98 4.48 2.95 0.05

Possibility of coming into contact with 2.88 2.28 2.56 3.43 2.62 0.05
other cultures
School is considerate of our religion 2.56 3.36 2.87 4.56 2.66 0.07

(see Table 6). The parents of children attending schools with a mostly immigrant
population rated ‘the possibility of coming into contact with other cultures’ and ‘the
school is considerate of our religion’ as more important than the parents of children
attending schools with a native Dutch majority. Given the relations between Islamic
religion and ethnic origin, the results regarding the influence of the ethnic composition
of the school on parental ratings of importance for school choice may be confounded.

Interactions between parental background and school characteristics

Thus far, some clear relations between parental background and characteristics of the
school, on the one hand, and rated importance of reasons for school choice, on the
other hand, have been observed. In the following, the extent to which combinations of
parental background factors and school characteristics appear to affect the degree of
importance assigned to the different reasons for school choice will be examined. The
focus will be on three specific combinations. First, the combination of parental religion
and the denomination of the school. Second, the combination of parental level of educa-
tion and the social milieu composition of the school. Third, the combination of parental
ethnicity and the ethnic composition of the school population.

Table 6. Mean ratings of importance for reasons for school choice provided by parents sending
children to schools with different ethnic compositions

Ethnic composition of school population

Reason for school choice > 50% immigrant > 50% native R2
n=1657 Dutch n=879

Possibility of coming into contact with 3.34 2.63 0.06

other cultures
School is considerate of our religion 3.88 2.79 0.11
360 E. Denessen et al.

Parental religion and denomination of the school. The cross-tabulation of parental

religion and denomination of the school showed almost half of the non-religious
parents to choose a religious school. Over 70% of the Protestant and Catholic parents
chose a school that fits their religion (see Table 7). However, Muslim parents were
found to choose mostly non-Islamic schools (only 11% of the Muslim parent chose
an Islamic school). For these results, the following two explanations can be given.
First the figures indicate that religious schools have been chosen by a large portion of
non-religious parents, which may imply that religious schools are often chosen for
non-religious reasons. Second, the availability of specific types of school may limit the
range of possible reasons that may actually lead to school choice. The rather low
number of Muslim parents to choose an Islamic school may be explained by the
rather limited availability of Islamic schools. In large parts of the Netherlands, for
example, the distance to the nearest Islamic school is considerable. Islamic schools
nevertheless have a rather uniform population, and no non-Muslim parent in this
sample has chosen an Islamic school for their child.
Three cells with a frequency of zero prevented the straightforward conduct of an
analysis of variance for parental religion and denomination of the school. We therefore
split the analyses into two parts. First, we analyzed the effects of parental religion and
school denomination, omitting Muslim parents and schools (see Table 8).5 Second,
we analyzed the ratings of the 17 reasons for school choice by the Muslim parents
sending their children to the schools with different denominations (see Table 9).
Table 8 shows ‘denomination of the school’ to be rated highest by parents with a
religious background congruent with the denomination of the child’s school. The
same holds for the ratings of ‘the school is considerate of our religion’. These results
show parents who rate these reasons as important to also actively seek and select a
school for the same reasons. However, as noted before, the reasons for school choice
that have been found to differ between religious groups have been rated relatively low,
compared to other reasons (see Table 1). For each religious group, the quality of
education remains the most important reason for school choice.
Table 9 shows ‘denomination of the school’ to also possibly be a leading reason for
the selection of a school and particularly an Islamic school by Muslim parents. More
specifically, Muslim parents who have chosen an Islamic school for their child rate
this reason as very important (4.48).
Table 9 also shows Muslim parents who have chosen an Islamic school for their
child to produce relatively lower ratings for ‘no other school was available’ and ‘the
school is within easy reach’ and relatively higher ratings for ‘other parents are our kind
of people’. Apparently, distance constitutes only a minor reason for these Muslim
parents to select an Islamic school. In contrast, the cultural (i.e., ethnic/religious)
background of the parents of the children attending the school may clearly encourage
Muslim parents to choose an Islamic school.

Parental level of education and social milieu composition of the school population. The
analyses of the influence of various levels of parental education in conjunction with
 Table 7. Crosstabulation of parental religion and denomination of school, including column percentages

Parental religion

No religion Protestant Catholic Islamic Total

Denomination Non-religious 1548 51.0% 316 15.2% 436 13.3% 817 43.1% 3117 30.3%
of school
Protestant 671 22.1% 1474 71.0% 312 9.5% 217 11.5% 2674 26.0%
Catholic 818 26.9% 287 13.8% 2525 77.1% 645 34.0% 4275 41.6%
Islamic 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 0 0.0% 216 11.4% 216 2.1%
Total 3037 100.0% 2077 100.0% 3273 100.0% 1895 100.0% 10282 100.0%

(chi-square = 5645.54, df = 9, p = 0.000; Cramer’s V = 0.43)

Segregation by choice? 361
362 E. Denessen et al.

Table 8. Mean ratings of importance and results of analyses of variance for reasons for school
choice according to specific combinations of parental religion and denomination of school

Denomination Denomination School is considerate

Parents’ religion of the school n of school of our religion

No religion Non-religious 1548 3.15 1.84

Protestant Protestant 1474 4.16 4.02
Catholic Catholic 2525 3.18 2.86
No religion Protestant 671 2.45 1.96
No religion Catholic 818 2.30 1.88
Protestant Non-religious 316 2.87 2.50
Protestant Catholic 287 3.14 3.01
Catholic Non-religious 436 2.61 2.17
Catholic Protestant 312 3.00 2.75
Total R2 0.19 0.32
Partial R2 interaction 0.09 0.04
effect

the social milieu composition of the school population on the ratings of importance
for the various reasons for school choice did not reveal any relevant results. This
shows the social milieu composition of the school population to not play an important
role in the process of selecting a school.

Parental ethnicity and ethnic composition of the school population. The analyses of the
influence of parental ethnic background in conjunction with the ethnic composition
of the school population on the ratings of importance for the various reasons for
school choice also did not reveal results of relevance. On the basis of the absence of
any such interaction effects, we can conclude that the differences in the ratings of
importance for the reasons for school choice reported for the native Dutch versus
immigrant parents in Table 4 are the same for the schools with at least 50% native
Dutch pupils and the schools with more than 50% immigrant pupils. Conversely, the
differences in the ratings of importance for the reasons for school choice reported by
the parents of children attending the two aforementioned types of schools (see Table
6) can be assumed to be the same for native Dutch and immigrant parents.

Discussion
In the present paper, the importance of 17 possible reasons for school choice and the
issue of group-specific reasons for school choice were addressed. The quality of
education was found to be one of the leading reasons for the selection of a school. In
addition, several of the other reasons for school choice appeared to be related to the
quality of education as a reason for school choice, including school climate, order and
discipline, and pupils attending this school to get ahead in society. A number of
 Table 9. Mean ratings of importance for reasons for school choice according to Islamic parental religion and denomination of school

Denomination of No other Other parents are our kind Denomination of School within
Parental religion the school n school available of people the school easy reach

Islamic Islamic 216 1.85 3.23 4.48 3.46

Islamic Non-religious 817 2.56 2.60 3.35 4.03
Islamic Protestant 217 2.45 2.47 2.72 3.83
Islamic Catholic 645 2.87 2.51 2.91 4.04
R2 0.04 0.03 0.14 0.03
Segregation by choice? 363
364 E. Denessen et al.

reasons related to the school’s infrastructure such as class size, attractive school build-
ing and reputation of the school were also related to the importance of the quality of
education as a reason for school choice. Beyond these reasons, two other sets of inter-
related reasons were found to be of importance for school choice. Two aspects of the
composition of the school population were found to be related: the social milieu back-
ground of the pupils attending the school and the other parents are the same kind of
people. And two issues of religious affiliation were also found to be related: the
denomination of the school and the school is considerate of parents’ religion. The
parents generally rated these compositional and religious reasons as being of less
importance than the quality of education reasons.
Group-specific reasons for school choice were mainly found to exist with respect to
religious and ethnic groups. In the Netherlands, religion is an important factor for
segregation within the educational system (Dronkers, 1995). With respect to different
religious groups, we can conclude that this is particularly the case for Muslim and Prot-
estant parents (with orthodox Protestant parents standing out among the Protestants
in particular; see Driessen & Van der Slik, 2001). Stated quite simply: Parents who
have chosen a Protestant or Islamic school for their child have often selected the school
for religious reasons. With regard to the effects of ethnicity on the relative importance
of different reasons for school choice, immigrant parents show a preference for schools
which are considerate of their religion and schools with an Islamic denomination. In
other words, the differences in the reasons for school choice reflect the differences
between immigrant and native Dutch parents with possible self-segregation along
these lines.
At present, many immigrant parents have not chosen an Islamic school for their
child. This is presumably due to the rather limited availability of Islamic schools in
the Netherlands. While there are currently 41 Islamic primary schools, the demand
for such is three to four times this amount (cf. Van Kessel, 2004). As the availability
of Islamic schools in the Netherlands increases, immigrant parents may collectively
opt for such schools and in this way contribute to segregation within the educational
system. This increase in segregation only seems to hold for Muslim parents, since
differences between native Dutch and ethnic minority parents seemed to be mainly a
religious matter.6 As opposed to the expected ‘white flight’ or departure of native
Dutch pupils from ‘black’ schools, a form of self-segregation is likely to occur when
immigrant Muslim parents actively seek and select a ‘black’ school for their child.
This process of self-segregation has yet to occur on a scale of marked significance due
to two factors. The first is the tightening of the criteria for the establishment of new
schools by the Ministry of Education (Driessen & Merry, 2004). The second is the
fact that Muslim parents are not very well organized, have little experience with and
are often frustrated in their efforts to establish new schools (Driessen & Bezemer,
1999).
A most remarkable result is the absence of any social milieu related effects on
the relative importance of reasons for school choice. In contrast to other studies
(see Ball et al., 1995, 1996), the present study did not reveal any relevant differ-
ences in the ratings of reasons for school choice across parents from different social
 Segregation by choice? 365

milieus. These results are consistent with the study of Gorard et al. (2003) who
also reported that segregation did not increase as a result of marketization. Further
research is needed to confirm these results. In this research different methods for
data-analyses should be used to get more insight in the hidden mechanism that
may be operating when especially native Dutch parents justify the reasons for
school choice. Bagley (1996) found marked discrepancies between the results of
analyses based on questionnaire versus interview data with the parents referring to
the racial aspects of choosing a school more often in the interviews and not rating
ethnic considerations as being of importance on the questionnaire. Bagley then
argued that the results of research on reasons for school choice may often thus be
biased by the method of data collection with interview data revealing attitudes not
captured by questionnaires. More qualitative measures may be needed to elicit
more accurate information regarding school choice. Direct inquiries into the
reasons for school choice may, alternatively, lead to social desirability and thereby
a response bias.
Finally, to gain greater insight into the complexity of the educational market and
the extent to which parents actually have a choice with regard to a child’s school,
some additional measures—including information on the actual distance between
home and school and the characteristics of the schools available to the parents—
should be utilized. The results of our study may be limited, due to the absence of
information on the specific local context in which parents have to make their choices.
According to Gorard et al. (2003), segregation effects may differ across educational
areas within one educational system. Especially within the Dutch system, in which a
strong religious diversity within regions exists (the southern part of the country being
overwhelmingly Catholic, and the northern part being overwhelmingly Protestant),
local studies are called for to bring nuances to the results of the present study. More-
over, localized studies could reveal the extent to which schools’ composition reflects
the composition of the local population on the one hand and the specific spatial
nature of competition (see Taylor, 2001) on the other. The results of the present
rather decontextualized study can only partly entangle the knot of the problem of
relating school choice to segregation within educational systems.
In closing, the results of the present study show group-specific reasons for school
choice to indeed contribute to increased religious—and consequently ethnic—
segregation across schools. Our results highlight the importance of religious and
ethnic factors, which may be typically Dutch and due in part to the religious plurifor-
mity of the Dutch educational system. Given the associations between school choice
and the characteristics of the educational system, the results of replication research in
other countries with less religious pluriformity than in the Netherlands could differ
from the present results. In those countries, the relationship between ethnicity and
religion may be less visible. Therefore religious factors may be incorporated in stud-
ies on segregation within those educational contexts. In general, a comparison of the
results of this study with the results of similar studies in other countries is called for
in order to better understand the general nature of the process of school choice in
western countries.
366 E. Denessen et al.

Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank the two anonymous referees for their very helpful
comments. The data used in the present analyses are from the Dutch cohort study
‘Primary education’ (‘PRIMA’). Collection of the data on this cohort was financially
supported by the Foundation for Behavioural Sciences from the Dutch Organization
for Scientific Research (NWO).

Notes
1. Given that the children were attending Grade 2, the parental choice of school was quite recent.
2. The response percentages presented here have been assessed by comparing the response with
information about parents provided by school administrations.
3. In 2002, 30% of the schools in the Netherlands were Catholic; 30% were Protestant; and 34%
were non-religious. In addition to these types of schools, about 16 other types of schools have
been officially recognized by the Dutch government and account for the remaining 6% of the
total number of schools in the Netherlands (NMECS, 2004). In contrast to many other
countries, the different types of schools in The Netherlands are almost all financed by the
government; the percentage of private schools is very small; and an open educational market
with considerable variety is the result. In the UK, a considerable variety of schools also exists,
but many of the schools are only accessible to those who can afford it. Recent efforts to obtain
public funding for Muslim schools in the UK have proved successful, however (Parker-Jenkins
& Hartas, 2002; Walford, 2002).
4. Due to the large sample size, over 90% of all statistical tests proved to be statistically significant.
Most of these significant effects, though, were very small. For purposes of the present study,
only the most relevant results are thus presented. More specifically, effects accounting for less
than 5% of the variance in the ratings of importance for the various reasons for school choice
have not been presented.
5. To test the differences between the ratings of parents whose religious, social milieu, or ethnic
background is congruent with denomination of the school, school’s social milieu composition
and school’s ethnic composition, respectively, and parents whose background is not congruent,
interaction effects were tested. Abelson and Prentice (1997) have provided some guidelines for
such tests, which they have called tests of matching hypotheses. For purposes of the present
study, only interaction effects accounting for at least 3% of the variance in the ratings of impor-
tance for the various reasons for school choice have been reported (also see note 4, above).
6. In this study 59% of the ethnic minority parents were Muslim.

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