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This study investigated the underexplored topic of teacher preparation program admissions processes by interviewing faculty and analyzing program documents. We investigated how 31 K-12 "mathematics and science" teacher preparation programs (MSTPPs) and faculty attend to diversity, equity, inclusion, and social and racial justice (DEIJ). Specific foci included applicant recruitment and selection, components of applications (e.g., forms, essays, interviews), and how applicants' DEIJ-related information and orientations factor into admissions. We found that all MSTPPs participating in the study collected information related to DEIJ (e.g., applicants' ethnoracial backgrounds, citizenship), and all interviewed faculty expressed an interest in increasing the diversity of applicants and admitted students. Faculty expressed preferences for applicants who evidenced positive DEIJ orientations, such as recognizing social and ethnoracial injustices, but at the same time, differences were evident in how MSTPPs and faculty attended to DEIJ. Considerations, implication, and dilemmas for teacher preparation programs and faculty are discussed.

Reading has been at the forefront of early-grade educational interventions, but addressing the educational needs of students in math early on is also critical given that early gaps in math skills widen further over the course of schooling. In this study, we examine the effects of Kentucky's Math Achievement Fund -- a unique state-level program that combines targeted interventions, peer-coaching, and close collaboration among teachers to improve math achievement in grades K-3 -- on student outcomes and the costs associated with this policy. We find significant positive effects of the program not only on math achievement, but also on test scores in reading and non-test outcomes including student attendance and disciplinary incidents. The benefits exist across racial/ethnic groups and students from different socioeconomic statuses, and they are slightly higher for racial minorities. These findings, along with the cost estimate of the program, suggest that this program could provide a cost-effective blueprint to address the educational needs of students in math in early grades.

Even though equity has become a hot topic, the pathway to making it a reality has not necessarily become clear. The national agenda on race, racial equity, and dealing with COVID-19 has pushed the challenge of equity to the front and center for schools. This pressurized moment in history has raised important questions: (1) What are the steps to an effective equity journey? and (2) What are the standards and targets to guide the pursuit of equity outcomes? What are the conditions for success in an effective, equitable district? What are the capacities and practices of equitable leaders and practitioners? This paper will highlight a few resources that may be helpful and will refer to many others. There are multitudes of resources available today to support equity development on a personal, organizational, institutional, and societal level. [The paper was prepared with the Center for Understanding Equity.]

Prepared for the Boston Foundation and signed onto by nearly two dozen representatives from across the political spectrum, "Unlocking College: Strengthening Massachusetts' Commitment to College in Prison" explores the landscape of educational opportunities in Massachusetts prisons. The report finds that despite evidence that educational opportunities improve racial equity and reduce recidivism, Massachusetts program face systemic challenges that have prevented program expansion. Addressing these issues is a moral and economic imperative - and it is a path a number of other states with both liberal and conservative leaders have already taken. The second half of the report explores lessons Massachusetts could take from these other states to create a broader system that complements the state's notable efforts to reduce the overall prison population statewide. Allowing college-in-prison programs to grow within the Massachusetts Department of Corrections would be the first, best step in the process, saving money and unlocking greater opportunities for thousands of people in the state.

This occasional paper presents national demographic subgroup data for the 1975-2021 Monitoring the Future (MTF) national survey results on 8th, 10th, and 12th graders' use of drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. The study covers all major classes of illicit and licit psychoactive drugs for an array of population subgroups. The 2020 subgroup data presented here accompany the "Monitoring the Future National Survey Results on Drug Use: 1975-2021: Overview, Key Findings on Adolescent Drug Use" (see ED618240) and the "Monitoring the Future National Survey Results on Drug Use, 1975-2021, forthcoming: Volume I, Secondary School Students." The trends offered here in tabular and graphic forms cover demographic subgroups based on: (1) Gender; (2) College plans; (3) Region of the country; (4) Population density; (5) Education level of the parents (a proxy for socioeconomic level); and (6) Racial/ethnic identification. Detailed descriptions of the demographic categories are provided in the section starting on page 469 of this paper. The graphs and tables in this occasional paper present trend data for 8th-, 10th-, and 12th-grade respondents separately. Data for 12th grade begins with 1975, the first year in which a nationally representative sample of high school seniors was surveyed. Data for 8th and 10th grades begin with 1991, when the study's nationally representative annual surveys were expanded to include surveys of those lower grade levels.

This study linked ninth-grade student background data and school-reported high school transcript data from the national High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 (HSLS:09) to student item responses on the 2013 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) mathematics assessment to examine the relationships between high school coursework and end-of-high school mathematics achievement. In a series of marginal maximum likelihood regression analyses, we find that STEM course GPAs, credits earned in AP/IB math and science courses, higher levels of math course content, and course-taking in chemistry and physics are all positively associated with NAEP math achievement. These relationships persist even when gender, race/ethnicity, early grade 9 mathematics achievement, and socioeconomic status are included as covariates. Cluster analysis of students with high estimated achievement suggest multiple paths to high mathematics achievement for students with both high- and low-socioeconomic status backgrounds.

Education savings accounts (ESAs) are education funding mechanisms that allow for families to receive a deposit of public funds to a government-authorized savings account. Using student-level longitudinal data, this paper examines how families participating in the Florida Gardiner Scholarship Program use education savings account funds. Results indicate that families use an increasing proportion of ESA funds when students remain in the program. The longer students remain in the program, the share of ESA funds devoted to private school tuition decreases while expenditure shares increase for curriculum, instruction, tutoring, and specialized services. Students in rural areas not only use a greater portion of their ESA funds than families in urban and suburban areas, but they also spend smaller portions of their funds on tuition and appear to customize more.

This study examined the performance of English learners (ELs) taking the ACT® test with testing supports, as compared to ELs and non-ELs taking the ACT without supports or accommodations. Contextual factors were also explored, including high school experiences and demographic characteristics such as low-income and first-generation college student status that may be associated with their scores. Results indicate that ELs tended to score substantially lower than non-ELs, and ELs who tested with supports tended to score lower than ELs who tested without supports. ELs in both groups, particularly those testing with supports, tended to take fewer core academic courses, fewer honors or AP courses, and had lower high school grades than non-ELs. ELs in both groups, particularly those testing with supports, were also more likely to be non-White, low income, and/or first-generation college students. Regression analyses found that demographic and contextual factors, along with limited English proficiency, played a substantial role in predicting the performance of ELs taking the ACT, both those testing with and without supports. It is important that ELs are provided with a rigorous education that includes instruction in both English language and core academic content to ensure that they have equitable opportunities and experiences as compared to their English proficient peers.

Principals (policy makers) have debated the progress in U.S. student performance for a half century or more. Informing these conversations, survey agents have administered seven million psychometrically linked tests in math and reading in 160 waves to national probability samples of selected cohorts born between 1954 and 2007. This study is the first to assess consistency of results by agency. We find results vary by agent, but consistent with Flynn effects, gains are larger in math than reading, except for the most recent period. Non-whites progress at a faster pace. Socio-economically disadvantaged white, black, and Hispanic students make greater progress when tested in elementary school, but that advantage attenuates and reverses itself as students age. We discuss potential moderators.

In recent ACT mode comparability studies, students testing on laptop or desktop computers earned slightly higher scores on average than students who tested on paper, especially on the ACT® reading and English tests (Li et al., 2017). Equating procedures adjust for such "mode effects" to make ACT scores comparable regardless of testing mode. However, it remains possible that the mode effects are different for different groups of students. For example, differences in performance between paper and online testing may be different for groups with different levels of comfort taking tests on computers. Thus, a general mode adjustment may be inappropriate. The purpose of this study was to explore the possibility of differential mode effects by gender, race/ethnicity, and ability using data from three recent mode comparability studies (Steedle, Pashley, & Cho, 2020). Results indicated that mode effects in English, reading, math, and science did not vary significantly between genders or race/ethnicity groups. Analyses detected significant interactions between mode effects and ability because mode effects tended to be smaller for lower ability examinees. Fortunately, equating processes appropriately adjust scores for differential mode effects by ability.

Racism exists within communities and within colleges. It is ever-present in the structures that professionals in the California Community Colleges system work within and that students of color must navigate. Striving to achieve equity is not enough and is not possible within the current community college system. Policies, processes, and other systemic structures built on a history of racism must first be dismantled and then rebuilt with a focus on equity and inclusion. Dismantling racist structures requires a review of the history that created those structures. It requires understanding the history of the construct of race as a culture, the white supremacy ideology, the centuries of laws intended to maintain positions of power for whites, and the ways in which the equity and diversity efforts within California's community colleges have fallen short. Constructing anti-racist structures and developing anti-racist campus cultures require an understanding of the tenets of antiracism education and principles for professional development. This paper provides foundational information for California community college practitioners to better understand the origins of today's racial conflict and reasons why gaps in achieving equitable educational outcomes for students, particularly for students of color, cannot be closed within current systems. The paper is intended to engage college practitioners in self-reflection and critical consciousness as they develop and deliver the strategic anti-racism education and professional development needed to reconstruct campus cultures and learning environments built on principles of equity and inclusion. It concludes with recommendations for individual growth, for local academic senates, for colleges and districts, and for the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges. [Title varies: "Anti-Racism Education in the California Community Colleges: Acknowledging Historical Context and Assessing and Advancing Effective Anti-Racism Practices for Faculty Professional Development."]

Existing research on self-management skills shows that measures of self-management predict student success. However, these conclusions are based on small samples or narrowly defined self-management measures. Using a rich longitudinal dataset of 221,840 fourth through seventh grade students, this paper describes self-management gaps across student groups, and confirms, at a large scale, the predictive power of self-management for achievement gains, even with unusually rich controls for students' background, previous achievement, and measures of other social-emotional skills. Self-management is a better predictor of student learning than are other measures of socio-emotional skills. Average growth in English language arts due to changing from a low to a high level of self-management is between 0.091 and 0.112 standard deviations, equivalent to almost 80 days of learning.

There is considerable interest in the impact of policy alternatives to race-based affirmative action (AA) on under-represented minority (URM) university enrollment. Widely-implemented alternatives include percent plans, which guarantee admission to top high school students, and holistic review, in which applications are evaluated on a comprehensive set of merits. This study estimates each policy's URM enrollment effect at the University of California (UC). Difference-in-difference estimates show that AA increased annual UC URM enrollment by more than 700 students (12%), and by more than 60% at the Berkeley and UCLA campuses. Three years after UC's AA program ended in 1998, UC guaranteed admission to the top 4 percent of students from each California high school under its Eligibility in the Local Context program. Extrapolation from a regression discontinuity design shows that ELC increased total URM enrollment among applicants annually by about 250, or 3.5%, primarily at three UC campuses. ELC largely ceased impacting UC enrollment after a 2012 reform, but triple-difference estimates show that several campuses' simultaneous switches to holistic review prevented URM enrollment decline. Six UC campuses have implemented holistic review, with an event study suggesting that each implementation increased URM enrollment at that campus by about 10%, though some enrollees were pulled from other UC campuses. While AA had a larger effect on URM enrollment than percent plans or holistic review, the latter policies have substantively mitigated URM enrollment declines at some UC campuses following AA's prohibition. [The author received additional financial support for this study from the Institute for Research on Labor and Employment.]

In this study, we examine which student and school characteristics predict students' perceptions of the school climate. Our data come from a survey administered to nearly 3,000 students in grades 4-12 in 18 charter schools throughout the country. The survey asks students about their perceptions of seven distinct aspects of the school's culture and climate: cultural and linguistic competence, learning strategies, rigorous expectations, school safety, sense of belonging, student engagement, and teacher-student relationships. We find substantial "within"-school variation in student perceptions of the school climate, which is explained in part by differences in student race/ethnicity and grade level. This finding suggests that among our diverse sample of charter schools, school climate surveys may be better suited to capture group-level differences in student experiences within a school as opposed to school-level differences. Although there is far less variation in student perceptions of school climate "between" schools, school composition, as measured by the racial/ethnic diversity of the school, is a meaningful predictor of student perceptions of the school's cultural and linguistic competence, student engagement, and sense of belonging. While further analyses are needed, our findings suggest that schools with more diverse student bodies may be better able to foster positive student experiences.

Of all college admission criteria, scores on nationally normed tests like the SAT and ACT are most affected by the socioeconomic background of the student. The effect of socioeconomic background on test scores has grown substantially at University of California over the past two decades, and tests have become more of a barrier to admission of disadvantaged students. In 1994, socioeconomic background factors--family income, parents' education, and race/ethnicity--accounted for 25 percent of the variation in test scores among California high school graduates who applied to UC. By 2011, they accounted for 35 percent. More than a third of the variation in SAT/ACT scores is attributable to differences in socioeconomic circumstance. Meanwhile, the predictive value of the tests has declined with the advent of holistic review in UC admissions. Holistic review has expanded the amount and quality of other applicant information, besides test scores, that UC considers in admissions decisions. After taking that information into account, SAT/ACT scores have become largely redundant and uniquely predict less than 2 percent of the variance in student performance at UC. The paper traces the implications of these trends for admissions policy. UC has compensated for the adverse impact of test scores on low income and first-generation college applicants by giving admissions preferences for those students, other qualifications being equal. Proposition 209 prevents UC from doing the same for Latino, African American, and Native American applicants. California is one of eight states to bar consideration of race and ethnicity as a factor in public university admissions. Yet UC data show that race has an independent and growing effect on test scores, after controlling for other socioeconomic factors. The growing correlation between race and test scores over the past 25 years reflects the growing segregation of Latino and black students in California's poorest, lowest-performing schools. Statistically, race has become as important as either family income or parents' education in accounting for test-score differences among UC applicants. Using the SAT and ACT under the constraints of Proposition 209 means accepting adverse impacts on underrepresented minority applicants beyond what can be justified by the limited predictive value of the tests. If UC cannot legally consider race as a socioeconomic disadvantage in admissions, neither should it consider scores on nationally normed tests. Race-blind implies test-blind admissions. The paper concludes with a discussion of options for replacing or eliminating the SAT and ACT in UC admissions.

Representative bureaucracy suggests that supervisors are representative of their employees based, in part, on shared values and identity. In education, we often observe representative asymmetries among school principals and the teaching faculty, particularly by race. This study explores the ways in which race congruence (or incongruence) between teachers and principals relates to key labor market behaviors, in particular, job searching, changing, applying, and hiring. Using an unprecedented and large-scale vacancy-application database coupled with administrative staffing records in Wisconsin, this study demonstrates that representative bureaucracy based on race operates at the stages of job searching and applying. The congruence effect is only notable for Minoritized teachers at the hiring stage, while White teachers show a greater effect when changing positions. Comparing the differences in marginal probabilities by racial combinations, we conclude race congruence effects are greatest for Minoritized teachers.

This essay discusses the contentious events leading to the decision by the University of California's Board of Regents to end affirmative action in admissions, hiring and contracting at the university in July 1995. This controversial decision provided momentum for California's passage of Proposition 209 the following year ending "racial preferences" for all of the state's public agencies. In virtually any other state, the debate over university admissions would have bled beyond the confines of a university's governing board. The board would have deferred to lawmakers and an even more complicated public discourse. The University of California's unusual status as a "public trust" under the state constitution, however, meant that authority over admissions was the sole responsibility of the board. This provided a unique forum to debate affirmative action for key actors, including Regent Ward Connerly and Governor Pete Wilson, to persuade fellow regents to focus and decide on a hotly debated social issue related to the dispersal of a highly sought public good -- access to a selective public university. Two themes are explored. The first focuses on the debate within the university community and the vulnerability of existing affirmative action programs and policies -- including a lack of unanimity among the faculty regarding the use of racial preferences. The second relates to the political tactics employed by Connerly and the saliency of his arguments, which were addressed to a larger public, and not to the academic community. Connerly attacked not only the idea of affirmative action but also the coherency of the university's existing admissions programs, the effectiveness of using race in admissions decisions, and the credibility of the university's administrative leaders who defended affirmative action.

This paper simulates a system of socioeconomic status (SES)-based affirmative action in college admissions and examines the extent to which it can produce racial diversity in selective colleges. Using simulation models, we investigate the potential relative effects of race- and/or SES-based affirmative action policies, alongside targeted, race-based recruitment, on the racial and socioeconomic distribution of students in colleges. These simulations suggest three important patterns: (1) neither SES-based affirmative action nor race recruiting policies on their own can reproduce levels of racial diversity achieved by race-based affirmative action; however, SES-based affirmative action in combination with targeted recruitment, although likely expensive, shows the potential to yield racial diversity levels comparable to race-based affirmative action; (b) the use of affirmative action policies by some colleges reduces the diversity of similar-quality colleges that do not have such policies; (c) overall, the combination of SES-based affirmative action and race recruiting results in slightly fewer Black and Hispanic students that are academically overmatched than under race-based affirmative action, but the schools that use the combination policy also see an overall reduction in the academic achievement of the students they enroll.

We examined the validity of 10 psychosocial factors for predicting retention status (stay, transfer, or drop out) at the start of second year of college by fitting a mixed-effects multinomial logistic regression model. Data consisted of retention records of 9,364 students from 31 four-year institutions. Predictors included commonly used variables for predicting college retention (i.e., high school grade point average [HSGPA], ACT Composite score, gender, family income, and race/ethnicity) and the 10 psychosocial factors. We examined the differential effects of psychosocial factors on retention status, namely which psychosocial attributes differentiated students who stayed from those who transferred or dropped out, and which psychosocial factors differentiated students who transferred from students who dropped out. Our results indicated that "Academic Discipline", "Commitment to College", "Social Connection", and "Academic Self-Confidence" incrementally predicted first-to-second year retention status above and beyond the commonly used variables. Specifically, students with higher "Academic Discipline", "Commitment to College", or "Social Connection" were "more" likely to stay at their institutions than to drop out or transfer; whereas students with higher "Academic Self-Confidence" were "less" likely to stay than to drop out or transfer, and also "less" likely to transfer than to drop out. These results were confirmed using a follow-up cross-validation analysis on a holdout sample of 4,804 students. These findings may have implications for interventions aimed at identifying students at risk of dropping out of college and for improving retention to the second year of college.

In this study we examine trends in segregation by race and ethnicity in higher education from 1985 to 2013. We have three key findings. Over the past 30 years, students from different groups have attended college at increasingly similar rates; gaps are decreasing. But these decreases have been driven largely by large increases in minority student enrollment at non-degree granting and two-year colleges. Once we condition on attendance at a degree granting school, we see "increasing" gaps over time. Finally, among only four-year colleges, attendance has been tilted in favor of White students and been relatively unchanged for nearly 30 years. The only exception to this has been for the very few minority students who are able to enroll at the most selective institutions.

For decades, assessing income has served as the tried-and-true method for creating financial aid packages--scholarships, grants, and loans--for the nation's college students. Each year, students and families living with low and moderate incomes submit income documentation to colleges, states, and the federal government in hopes of qualifying for financial aid to defray college costs. But what if a student's wealth status revealed more about their ability to cover college costs than their income did? Income is an important measure, but it provides only a snapshot of the full resources available to students and their families. Wealth, too, impacts a student's access and ability to pay for college as well as their chances of graduating and turning career aspirations into a well-paying job and fulfilling life. Examining income alone masks deep and persistent inequities in wealth by race or ethnicity. This gap, which is rooted in generations of discrimination and systemic barriers to opportunity, affects the college dreams of countless people, particularly those from historically marginalized communities. Limitations in available data mean researchers and policymakers know relatively little about how wealth impacts higher education, with far more attention focused on understanding and addressing the effects of income. This paper seeks to address that missing piece by exploring the impact of wealth on students' experiences in higher education and how these experiences, in turn, influence wealth-building.

This paper investigates how teachers learn about race in the school context, with a particular focus on teachers' development of racial competency. Using in-depth, semi-structured interviews we find that teachers learn through three sources: from their peers, from years of experience, and from teacher preparation and in-service experiences. Furthermore, we find that learning occurs both informally and formally and that these sources of learning are moderated by three contextual factors: career status, school culture, and out-of-school factors We find that teachers rely most on informal avenues and encounters to develop racial competency.