In the past two decades in the United States, more than 1,600 Catholic elementary and secondary schools have closed, and more than 4,500 charter schools―public schools that are often privately operated and freed from certain regulations―have opened, many in urban areas. With a particular emphasis on Catholic school closures, Lost Classroom, Lost Community examines the implications of these dramatic shifts in the urban educational landscape.  More than just educational institutions, Catholic schools promote the development of social capital―the social networks and mutual trust that form the foundation of safe and cohesive communities. Drawing on data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods and crime reports collected at the police beat or census tract level in Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles, Margaret F. Brinig and Nicole Stelle Garnett demonstrate that the loss of Catholic schools triggers disorder, crime, and an overall decline in community cohesiveness, and suggest that new charter schools fail to fill the gaps left behind. This book shows that the closing of Catholic schools harms the very communities they were created to bring together and serve, and it will have vital implications for both education and policing policy debates. “There is ample research to demonstrate inner-city Catholic schools’ educational excellence, going back to the pioneering Coleman/Greeley studies in the 1970s. Now comes an even more comprehensive claim about the positive impact of these schools: For, according to two law professors at the University of Notre Dame, Margaret F. Brinig and Nicole Stelle Garnett, inner-city Catholic schools are important factors in urban renewal as builders of ‘social capital.' . . . Inner-city Catholic schools are in deep financial crisis, with strapped dioceses scrambling to find the dollars to subsidize indisputably effective schools that can no longer support themselves by themselves. Brinig and Garnett argue that, given their demonstrably positive impact across society, these schools should be given a fighting chance through mechanisms like tuition tax credits or vouchers, with public funds going to the child to enable students to attend an inner-city Catholic school.” -- George Weigel ― First Things “The authors make the ingenious argument that they can detect the distinct influence of the closing of a Catholic school because such events are not related only to the increase of poverty and the growth of minority populations. Which schools in such areas close, they argue on the basis of detailed knowledge of how Catholic schools operate, depends on the commitment of the pastor of the parish. . . . One suspects that the effect of the Catholic school on its neighborhood is unique, as the commitments between school, teachers, administrators, parents, and students are strengthened by residence in the same neighborhood, as well as the tie of a common religion binding many of them. If Catholic schools have such effects, one must raise the question, and the authors do, of why these schools cannot get public funds: they do as good a job of educating their students as public schools, perhaps better. But while voucher programs, for example, have overcome legal prohibitions in some states, political resistance to the flow of substantial public funds to schools not under the control of districts remains intense.” -- Nathan Glazer, Harvard University ― Education Next "For principals and teachers working in inner-city schools, these findings are not something new. However, this is the first time that scholars made an empirical analysis of the data to prove what was already known anecdotally." -- Joyce Duriga ― Catholic New World “By all accounts, the loss of an inner-city Catholic school is a blow to its disadvantaged students. But is there more to this story? What happens to the neighborhood―the urban fabric―when the bells stop ringing once and for all? That question is probed in a groundbreaking new book, Lost Classroom, Lost Community .” -- William Bole ― OSV Newsweekly “Brinig and Garnett add another argument to the case for Catholic education: Catholic schools are essential to a community’s health, especially in inner-city neighborhoods. . . . The book . . . is about more than Catholic education or education reform―it is important for anyone interested in the health of our cities.” ― US Catholic Magazine “Can’t recommend it highly enough. . . . Brinig and Garnett take a novel tack. Rather than wade into academic effects, they use a rich data set of social cohesion measures and crime data from Chicago, Philadelphia, and Los Angeles to track the effect of closing Catholic schools on neighborhoods. Not to spoil the ending, but closing Catholic schools rends the fabrics of low income communities and can be linked to an increase in crime. . . . If this is the one book you read about the state of Catholic education (and school choice policy) in America, it w