Probing Structural Inequality: Expansion of Audit Examinations to Educational Contexts

Session Type: Symposium

Abstract

As experiences of discrimination continue to be pervasive in education, research increasingly employs both qualitative and quantitative methods to measure these instances. Amid these efforts, the education system remains largely colorblind, post-racial, and unequivocally skeptical about the existence of structural discrimination. In response, the papers in this symposium employed audit/field experimental techniques to objectively examine discrimination across educational institutions. Papers focus on both racial and gender discrimination, examining how secondary educational institutions restrict underrepresented students’ access to STEM curriculum (Paper1) and are tracked away from enrolling in AP courses (Paper 2), and how discrimination in university settings can both restrict underrepresented students’ college enrollment (Paper 3) and limit their opportunity for academic collaboration with peers and faculty (Paper 4).

Sub Unit

• Division L - Educational Policies and Politics / Division L - Section 7: Social Context and Structural Inequalities

Chair

• Jayley Ann Janssen, Arizona State University

Papers

• Guidance or Gatekeeping: An Audit Examination of Racial Discrimination in U.S. Premiere STEM Schools - Jayley Ann Janssen, Arizona State University; Eleanor Seaton, Arizona State University; Justin Jager, Arizona State University; Cindy Miller, ASU

• Do School Counselors Exhibit Bias in Recommending Students for Advanced Coursework? - Dania Francis, University of Massachusetts - Amherst; Angela de Oliveira, University of Massachusetts; Carey Dimmitt, University of Massachusetts - Amherst

• Bias in Online Classes: Evidence From a Field Experiment - Rachel Baker, University of California - Irvine; Thomas Dee, Stanford University; Brent Joseph Evans, Vanderbilt University; June John, Stanford University

• Criminal Records and Higher Education Access: A College Admissions Experiment - Robert Stewart, University of Maryland