Social Equity Theory and Racial-Ethnic Achievement Gaps

2012 ◽  
Vol 84 (4) ◽  
pp. 1120-1136 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clark McKown
Keyword(s):  
Equity Theory ◽  
Social Equity ◽  
Achievement Gaps ◽  
Racial Ethnic

When Does Inequality Grow? A Seasonal Analysis of Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Learning From Kindergarten Through Eighth Grade

2020 ◽  
pp. 0013189X2097785
Author(s):  
Megan Kuhfeld ◽  
Dennis J. Condron ◽  
Doug B. Downey
Keyword(s):  
White Students ◽  
Ethnic Disparities ◽  
Achievement Gaps ◽  
Asian Students ◽  
Eighth Grade ◽  
Older Students ◽  
Eighth Grade Students ◽  
Seasonal Analysis ◽  
Racial Ethnic ◽  
Important Evidence

What role does schooling play in the development of racial/ethnic inequalities in academic skills? Seasonal learning studies, which allow researchers to compare the growth of achievement gaps when school is in versus out of session, provide important evidence regarding whether schools reduce, reproduce, or exacerbate educational inequalities. Most studies that have compared the growth of achievement gaps when school is in versus out of session have been restricted to the early grades. In this study, we examine seasonal patterns of racial/ethnic achievement gaps using test scores from over 2.5 million kindergarten to eighth-grade students. Following three different cohorts of students from 2015 to 2018, we find that Black-White achievement gaps widen during school periods and shrink during summers, whereas Asian students generally pull ahead of White students at a faster rate during summers. At the same time, we find that disparities observed among older students are largely in place among kindergartners. Our results imply that although schooling does have disparate impacts on the learning trajectories of students, schools play less of a role in widening racial/ethnic achievement gaps than children’s prekindergarten environments.

scholarly journals Understanding the linkages between racial/ethnic discipline gaps and racial/ethnic achievement gaps in the United States

2019 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 154
Author(s):  
Maithreyi Gopalan
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Positive Association ◽  
The United States ◽  
Achievement Gaps ◽  
Significant Positive Association ◽  
Education Data ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Racial Achievement ◽  
Racial Ethnic

This study estimates racial/ethnic discipline gaps, using multiple measures of school discipline outcomes, in nearly all school districts in the United States with data collected by the Office of Civil Rights between 2013 and 2014. Just like racial/ethnic achievement gaps, discipline gaps also vary substantially, ranging from negative to greater than two standard deviations, across districts. However, unlike the correlates of racial achievement gaps, the extensive set of district-level characteristics available in the Stanford Education Data Archive (SEDA) including economic, demographic, segregation, and school characteristics, explain roughly just one-fifth of the geographic variation in Black-white discipline gaps and one-third of the variation in Hispanic-white discipline gaps. This study also finds a modest, statistically significant, positive association between discipline gaps and achievement gaps, even after extensive covariate adjustment. The results of this analysis provide an important step forward in determining the relationship between two forms of persistent inequality that have long plagued the U.S. education system. 

scholarly journals Individualizing Student Instruction in Reading

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carol McDonald Connor ◽  
Frederick J. Morrison
Keyword(s):  
Instructional Program ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
Achievement Gaps ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Child Assessment ◽  
Group Instruction ◽  
Public Attention ◽  
Online Technology ◽  
Children's Literacy ◽  
Racial Ethnic

Despite three decades of scientific and public attention on efforts to improve literacy in America, little progress has been made in closing achievement gaps across racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic lines. This article argues that one major reason is failure to take into account the mosaic of strengths and weaknesses individual children bring to school. With this comes the failure to develop personalized instruction for each child. We briefly review the research available and then describe how research, ours and others, supports the efficacy of individualizing student instruction (ISI) and illustrates how society might close achievement gaps. ISI, and other regimes, offer a systematic instructional program, incorporate child assessment, and present personalized small-group instruction. In ISI, this is aided by computer-generated recommendations and planning tools in the A2i online technology, coupled with extensive, ongoing professional development (PD). ISI has been shown to be highly effective from preschool through third grade in improving children’s literacy skills. The practical and policy implications of implementing effective instruction are discussed.

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