Our data included 2022-2023 characteristics of public schools across the United States, including information about student-to-teacher ratio, student demographics, and data about free and reduced school lunches. Our goal was to see if there was a correlation between the student demographic data and the number of kids eligible for free lunches in different schools.
The dataset was too large to work with, so we narrowed it down to the Springfield/Eugene area, and eventually even further to four schools with the highest percentage of free lunch eligible students and four schools with the lowest. The demographic data was overwhelming as well, so we focused on the three highest populations--Hispanic, White, and Two or More ethnicities. Thirty-eight public schools fall within the Springfield/Eugene lines, and all of them were made up of predominantly white students. To look for a relationship, we needed to focus on the differences in the ratio of demographics between the schools we chose.
Through this angle, we found that the schools with the highest percentage of students eligible for free school lunches had a smaller majority of white people and a higher percentage of Hispanic students. Likewise, schools with the lowest percentage of students eligible for free lunches have a greater majority of white students and a smaller percentage of Hispanic students. Regarding the demographics for students of two or more ethnicities, there was more variation. However, on average, there were slightly more students of two or more ethnicities in the schools with higher percentages of free-lunch eligible students, but not enough for it to be significant.
This implies that there is a connection between ethnicity and free school lunch eligibility, which could therefore be used to argue a connection between race and income, because income determines eligibility for free lunches.
We explored the connection between free and reduced lunch data and the student race demographics in the Eugene-Springfield area.