Married or Divorced? A Quantitative Assessment of Educational Attainment for a National Sample of Black Students based on Parental Configuration

This article investigates Black students’ educational attainment in relationship to parental divorce. Using a national representative sample from the Educational Longitudinal Study (ELS), which is part of the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the authors have found several outcomes: (a) Female students were impacted more by divorce than male students, (b) College Social Capital and Positive Class Preparedness were positive impacts on females and males, (c) Home Environment variables operated differently for female versus male students, and (d) Economic Capital variables indicated that socioeconomic status was significant for both males and females. These results suggest that different and innovative tools which address race, gender, and class are needed to assess divorce in the Black family.