Equity in Equations? Inequalities in High School Math Across Race, Ethnicity, and Gender

• In Event: Sociology of Education Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 22. STEM Course Enrollment and Performance across Groups

Abstract

High school mathematics is organized as a rigid, hierarchical sequence in which early placement structures subsequent academic opportunities. Unlike more flexible subjects, math courses follow a tightly ordered progression, limiting students’ ability to recover once they fall behind. Prior research shows persistent racial, ethnic, and gender disparities in advanced math participation, yet we know less about how these inequalities intersect with race, ethnicity, and gender at the point of ninth-grade placement and unfold across high school and into postsecondary education. Drawing on intersectionality theory, this study examines whether the consequences of ninth-grade math placement vary across race, ethnicity, and gender. Using data from the High School Longitudinal Study of 2009 (HSLS:09), I examine trajectories of ninth-graders through high school and into college. Students are categorized into three initial pathways (below algebra, in algebra, or above algebra), and linked to subsequent math attainment, high school graduation, college enrollment, and remedial math placement. I implement doubly robust inverse probability weighting based on multinomial logistic models predicting ninth-grade placement. Weighted linear probability models estimate associations between initial placement and future outcomes, with particular attention to intersectional differences by race, ethnicity, and gender. By identifying ninth grade as a critical institutional juncture, this study highlights how early placement decisions may reproduce intersectional inequalities in educational attainment and postsecondary math outcomes.

Author

• Tanya Sanabria, California State University-Los Angeles