Attacking the African American-White Achievement Gap on College Admissions Tests

For decades researchers have discussed the lower levels of educational achievement of African American compared with white students. ¹ This achievement gap exists even among the youngest children; African American students arrive at kindergarten considerably behind their white peers in measurable cognitive skills. ² Although the gap has narrowed somewhat over the past several decades, the average African American still scores below 75 percent of white students on standardized tests. ³

Alarming racial gaps are consistently found on the SAT, which plays an important role in the quality of access to higher education and, in turn, to social and economic mobility. Between 1976 and 1988 substantial progress was made in closing the gap, and the advantage for whites was reduced by 25 percent. ⁴ In subsequent years, however, the gap has remained steady or even increased slightly. In 1999 the African American-white SAT gap was between 0.75 and 1 full standard deviation (SD). ⁵

A seemingly endless array of theories has been advanced to explain the consistently lower academic performance of African American students: linguistic and social incongruities between home and school culture; historic immigrant status; differing levels and types of parental involvement; contrasting forms of cultural and social capital; the generally lower socioeconomic status (SES) of African American children; divergent study habits and motivational levels; racist and classist school practices; African American adolescents' fear of "acting white"; the quantity and quality of academic material to which minority students are exposed; and lower teacher expectations of African American students. Although these theories come in and out of favor, one that has remained relatively constant is the lower quality of schools attended by African American students. This paper investigates the African American-white achievement gap on the SAT at both the student and school level. Even though the achievement gap has been a long-term concern to educational policymakers and researchers, research that applies the appropriate methodology to investigate the influence of both student and school characteristics upon the gap is sparse.

Background

The following brief overview of research that examines racial disparities in academic achievement reflects our analytical approach, in that it explores both student- and school-level influences on achievement.

Student-Level Relationships:
Social Class and SAT Performance

Researchers consistently report a strong relationship between social class and performance on the SAT, with students from more affluent, more educated families scoring higher. ⁶ On average, students whose parents have some graduate school experience score over 0.4 standard deviations above the SAT mean, while students from families with yearly incomes above $100,000 score one-half standard deviation above the mean. ⁷ The relationship between family income and SAT scores appears to be stronger among African American than white students. An almost 130-point gap on combined SAT scores separates African American students whose parents earn less than $10,000 from those whose parents earn more than $100,000. Among white students the gap between these same income ranges is only 50 points. ⁸ Although disparities in social class among African Americans and whites remain stark, these differences generally explain less than one-third of the achievement gap in standardized test scores. ⁹

Many researchers have concluded that one path through which SES influences achievement in high school is the academic courses in which students enroll. Over the past two decades, researchers have placed increasing emphasis upon the relationship between course taking and achievement. Historically, high schools organized their curricula into tracks, wherein students followed prescribed courses of study based on their measured (or perceived) attributes, abilities, and future occupational and educational plans. Contemporary comprehensive high schools have largely moved away from formal tracking and permit students to select their own courses and programs of study. Hence curricular choice...