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As Missouri lawmakers debate open enrollment for a fifth consecutive year, is shedding light on how public school residency restrictions can discriminate against low-income students.

The report, published Wednesday by the nonprofit watchdog group , finds that Missouri has some of the strictest school residential assignment policies in the nation. District attendance boundaries mirror historic racist housing redlining maps and are limiting student access to high-performing schools, said Tim DeRoche, the organization’s founder.

鈥淲henever the government assigns children to public schools, then the government also takes on the role of excluding those children from other public schools 鈥� that鈥檚 where the split starts to get problematic,鈥� DeRoche said. 鈥淚n Missouri, there’s just very strict assignment-based policies in districts. It鈥檚 very hard to cross district lines in Missouri as opposed to other states.鈥�

Available to All鈥檚 report estimated that 94% to 96% of Missouri public school students attend their assigned school, based on their home address. State law has , such as if a student is homeless, parents pay property taxes at another location or a school loses accreditation. 

The lack of ability for students to easily transfer schools inside or outside their district encourages wealthy families to buy houses next to high-quality schools, DeRoche said. 

鈥淚t creates this very strict system where kids, especially low-income kids and low-income kids of color, get locked into struggling or failing schools, and the families have very few options to find another home for them,鈥� he said.

DeRoche said the boundaries on redlining maps that were drawn a century ago to determine who got access to government-insured home mortgages largely correspond to the state鈥檚 school attendance lines. 

鈥淧arts of towns that have high concentrations of people of color or immigrants or working-class folks are excluded鈥� from receiving that sort of housing assistance, DeRoche said. 鈥淲e found three examples where the school zone in Missouri overlaps or mirrors the pattern on redlining maps from 80 to 90 years ago.鈥�

One school attendance boundary cited by the report runs north to south through St. Louis. Children living east of the line are assigned to the St. Louis City School District, where roughly 20% of students score proficient or better on state reading and math tests. Children located west of the line are assigned to Clayton School District, where nearly 75% of students are proficient or better on the same exams. The boundary, according to the report, “mirrors the pattern of the racist redlining map created by the federal government in 1937.”

In the St. Joseph School District, Field Elementary School 鈥� located near an area described as a 鈥渃hoice part of the city鈥� in redlining maps 鈥� has significantly higher math and reading proficiency rates than Lindbergh Elementary School, located 2 miles away. The Lindbergh neighborhood was described in redlining maps as 鈥渁 poor area and one which lenders avoid,鈥� according to the report.

A 2024 analysis by New America, a left-leaning think tank based in Washington, D.C., found this line is among the 100 most segregating district borders in the nation in terms of poverty rate disparity among school-aged children.

Because of the steep inequality across district boundaries, DeRoche said, it鈥檚 not uncommon for parents to lie about where they live to give their child an education at a higher-performing school. Schools in Missouri 鈥� and across the nation, he said 鈥� often investigate students’ residences to find families that aren鈥檛 living within district boundaries. 

These inspections are conducted by school officials, teachers or even private investigators hired by the district, according to the Available to All report.

A by St. Louis Public Radio and Midwest Newsroom found the Hazelwood School District, which enrolls roughly 16,000 students in suburban St. Louis, performed 2,051 residency investigations during the 2022-23 school year. In 2018-19, the district conducted just 148.

Parents can be charged with a misdemeanor for falsifying their children’s enrollment records, according to

State Rep. Brad Pollitt has been trying to expand school choice in Missouri with open enrollment bills for the last five years. He reintroduced his proposal again this year in hopes it will finally make it to the state Senate floor. 

, the Public School Open Enrollment Act, would allow any K-12 student to attend a school in a nonresident district, depending on factors including disciplinary and attendance records, the school’s student-to-teacher ratio, class sizes and building capacity. Only 3% of a district鈥檚 students would be allowed to leave each year.

According to , the bill doesn鈥檛 require school districts to accept students living outside the area, but districts that do would receive extra funding.

DeRoche said Available to All recommends that Missouri require districts to enroll children from outside their boundaries when schools have space available. 

鈥淪chool finance policies should ensure that education dollars can flow across district lines, enabling Missouri families to access the public schools that they feel are the right fit for their children,鈥� the report says.

It also recommends that schools reserve a specific percentage of seats for students who live outside the district.

鈥淭here鈥檚 an opportunity for reform,鈥� DeRoche said. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 take a stand on individual bills, but there is a chance [to create] best practices in protecting equal access to public schools.鈥�

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