The Seattle School District is using race to assign students to schools for the coming school year, in violation of Washington's voter-approved civil rights law.

The finding comes in a new report by analyst Robert Holland and released today by the Equal Citizenship Project. The Project conducts research on civil rights issues as part of the Washington Institute Foundation, an independent, non-profit think tank based in Seattle.

According to the study, Seattle school children can be denied the opportunity to go to the school of their choice because of race.

School policy holds that "preference will be given" to any student that helps meet the pre-determined racial quota education officials have set for the chosen school. The policy further states that, "Each school will be designated as integration positive for whites, non-whites or for all ethnic groups," depending on whether it has a higher-than-average white or minority population than the surrounding area. Students who do not meet the race criteria are denied this preference.

For example, the child of one Seattle family was denied entrance to the neighborhood school only six blocks from their home, and were instead assigned to a different school over a mile away. The student was denied admission after being designated "integration negative" for the school which the family can see from the windows of their home. Six other students, who were listed as "integration positive," were moved ahead on the preferred school’s waiting list.

Initiative 200, now law under RCW 49.60.400, says "the state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of... public education."

The admissions policy exposes the School District, and taxpayers, to costly civil rights law suits if students are denied an educational opportunity because of their race, color, ethnicity or national origin.

"The people of Washington made it clear they expect the government to stop judging citizens based on race. That makes it all the more surprising that the Seattle School District would risk continuing a policy in spite of the new law," said Robert Holland, chief analyst and director of the Equal Citizenship Project.