Racial Harassment and the Black-White Advanced Placement Enrollment Gap: A Multilevel Analysis

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 1
  In Roundtable Session: Research on Creativity, Talent Development, and Giftedness Roundtable 1

Abstract

Black students remain under enrolled in AP courses compared to White peers, even with intentional outreach. One possible reason for this continued disparity is that Black students may choose not to enroll in AP courses where they are racially isolated. Using the 2017-2018 Civil Rights Data Collection and multilevel modeling, I examine the association between incidents of racial harassment where Black students were the victim and the Black-White AP enrollment parity in a school. Controlling for various school and district factors, I find that incidents of racial harassment on campus are not statistically significant factors in predicting AP enrollment disparity and argue that current reporting practices may not be nuanced enough to capture the pervasiveness of anti-Blackness in schools.

Author

• Jake D. Winfield, Temple University