Compensatory education programs in the United States are supplements to regular education programs and are designed to compensate for disadvantages experienced by children, especially those living in poverty. As Claude S. Fischer and his colleagues have noted, inequalities in the educational system have been brought about by “inequality by design” due to housing discrimination, zoning of neighborhoods, and isolating poor people and racial minorities in public housing projects. Once people are concentrated in a particular area, it is easy to offer them inferior education. As Robert L. Green maintains, it is important to institute equality by design. In other words, educators must deliberately design programs to help overcome inequities of the past and present.

A classic example of inequality by design occurred in Prince Edward County, ...