Predictors of College Participation in STEM: The Role of High School Racial Composition

• In Event: 207 - Section on Sociology of Education Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Refereed Roundtable: Section on Sociology of Education Roundtables (one-hour). Table 01. STEM: Access, Aspirations, and Attainment

Abstract

There is a widespread interest in increasing STEM participation of younger generations. The supply of STEM professionals is not meeting the increasing demand for people working in these fields. This paper gives attention to the importance of the pre-college contexts students experience in shaping the decision to major (or not) in STEM. In this study, we argue that attending a school with a higher percentage of white students increases the opportunities to learn that students have and consequently impacts students’ choice of major. We analyze longitudinal data from students who spent their academic careers in North Carolina public secondary schools and attended North Carolina public universities. The nature of our dataset allows us to investigate the association between the student racial composition of the high school attended and students’ math SAT, intent to major in STEM, STEM related GPA during their first year in college and finally their decision to major in STEM. Our results suggest that although having attended high schools with higher proportion of white students is related to higher math and science school and college achievement outcomes, attending Whiter schools is negatively associated with intending to major in STEM and actually declaring and majoring in STEM when in college.

Authors

• Martha Cecilia Bottia, University of North Carolina-Charlotte

• Elizabeth Stearns, University of North Carolina-Charlotte

• Stephanie Moller, University of North Carolina-Charlotte