Patterns and Trends in RacialEthnic and

Patterns and Trends in Racial/Ethnic and Scoioeconomic Academic Achievement Gaps Reardon

Segregation patterns are strongly associated with racial disparities in educational outcomes (p. 492) When the achievement gap narrows for white/hispanic in early school years, it’s concentrated in recent immigrants; likely due to language acquisition.  (p. 498)

“One factor confounding such analyses is the fluid nature of socioecomonic status—unlike race or gender, socioeconomic characteristics of a family change over time, often quite dramatically” (p. 499)       -> this highlights the issue I’ve been having with working my way through the abstraction. 

Being in a higher-achieving percentile of a racial group is associated with greater achievement gaps across racial groups. Due to accountability pressure? (P. 500)

SES explains 85% of achievement differences at the beginning of school. At 3rd grade, 60%. (p. 501) —> School reifies race. Others find the opposite; multi-generational SES shown to explain nearly all of racial achievement gap differences. 

—> Differences in particular findings can be pivotal to the construction of different narratives. (Do schools reify hierarchicalized race?)

Test score disparities are highly predictive of corresponding disparities in subsequent labor market outcomes (p. 503-504). [Almost all wage disparities explained by test-score differences.] Marginal value of education increases with more education. “Racial disparities at the top of the achievement distribution have become increasingly salient in shaping labor market inequalities."   (p. 505)