BALTIMORE — Some of the most cherished ideas about what it takes to get more low-income and minority students on the path to college were shattered Wednesday at a conference meant to celebrate and build upon the 50-year-old legacy of a groundbreaking report about inequality in America’s public education.
Among the ideas that were overturned is the notion that mere exposure to “college knowledge” will make a meaningful difference in closing racial gaps in college enrollment.
Guan Saw, an assistant professor of educational psychology at the University of Texas at San Antonio, argued that many of the “college exposure” interventions that populate the education landscape today won’t do the job. Instead, he said, it’s going to take teachers who are able to teach more advanced courses in math and science, which he said are more predictive of college enrollment than simply meeting with school counselors and admission officers or sending college guides and the like to students and their families.
“We argue in this paper that policy has been failing to focus on core preparation that is crucial for college-going,” Saw said.
While minority and low-income students have high college aspirations, they are being shortchanged when it comes to the advanced-level math and science instruction that makes a difference, Saw’s paper states.
“We have found that in many low-income and minority schools, there are fewer teachers who are able to teach the more advanced courses in subjects such as math and science,” states the paper, titled “Racial and Ethnic Gaps in Postsecondary Aspirations, Preparation and Enrollment.”
“Moreover, teachers in these schools are more likely to be inexperienced and to leave after one or two years, creating an unstable school environment,” the paper states.
