Structure and agency in resistance to schooling: Class, race, and the reproduction of unequal outcomes.

For low-income and marginalized racialized minority youth, declining prospects of mobility can undermine favorable attitudes toward schooling if adolescents anticipate limited utility in schooling. We find that adolescents' awareness of race and class inequality affects a complex set of attitudes toward schooling, and that these attitudes contribute to outcomes varying by race/ethnicity and class. We capitalize on a unique longitudinal dataset with a random stratified sample of 1428 Black and White high school graduates from a large school system. Using surveys and administrative data, we show how structural factors and student characteristics shape educational attitudes; and then how these attitudes, school structural features, student, family, and neighborhood factors predict educational outcomes. We find the common ground between Willis' resistance theory emphasizing class and Ogbu's cultural-ecological model focusing on race. Results provide greater conceptual clarity for core constructs associated with both theories of resistance.

Does school SES matter less for high-performing students than for their lower-performing peers? A quantile regression analysis of PISA 2018 Australia.

Background: While the relationship between school socioeconomic composition and student academic outcomes is well established, knowledge about differential effects is not extensive. In particular, little is known whether the relationship differs for students with varying levels of academic performance. We examined whether the school socioeconomic composition effect on academic achievement is stronger or weaker for high-performing students than for average- and low-performing students. Australia is a theoretically interesting case study as it has high levels of school socioeconomic segregation compared to other economically developed countries. Methods: We conducted quantile regression analysis using data from the Australia PISA 2018 sample (N = 14,273 15-year-old students). We examined the effect of school socioeconomic status (school SES) on student performance in reading, mathematical and scientific literacy. Results: We found that the school socioeconomic composition effect is substantial and is similar for all students, regardless of their level of academic performance. The findings also show that school SES is a stronger predictor than student SES for all student performance quintiles, and the size of the school SES effect relative to the size of student SES effect is larger in lower performance quintiles. Conclusions: These results indicate no differential effect of school SES on reading, mathematical or scientific literacy for students of varying levels of academic performance. The relationship is similarly strong and positive for high-performing students as it is for their lower performing peers. As school SES is a strong predictor for all students regardless of their level of academic performance, we argue that equity of educational outcomes can be best achieved by policies and structures that promote socioeconomically mixed rather than segregated schools. We also call for more research that seeks to identify and understand possible differential effects of school socioeconomic composition on a range of academic and non-cognitive student outcomes.

Public opinion, race, and levels of desegregation in five Southern school districts.

Many of the nation's school systems that were once desegregated have resegregated by race and socioeconomic status-some more so than others. We investigate the relationship between public opinion about school diversity and levels of resegregation in five Southern school districts with varying amounts of resegregation: Charlotte, NC; Louisville, KY; Nashville, TN; Raleigh, NC; and Rock Hill, SC. Drawing upon case studies of the five districts and a unique public opinion dataset of over 5000 respondents, we find the relationship between attitudes toward diverse education and levels of desegregation strengthens when we control for respondents' race. In all five locales, we find a strong positive correspondence between Whites' attitudes and actual levels of desegregation. At the same time, we observe a negative relationship between Black respondents' attitudes toward school diversity and desegregation levels. We explore possible reasons for these relationships.

Race and gender differences in how sense of belonging influences decisions to major in STEM.

BACKGROUND: Women and students of color are widely underrepresented in most STEM fields. In order to investigate this underrepresentation, we interviewed 201 college seniors, primarily women and people of color, who either majored in STEM or started but dropped a STEM major. Here we discuss one section of the longer interview that focused on students' sense of belonging, which has been found to be related to retention. In our analysis, we examine the intersections of race and gender with students' sense of belonging, a topic largely absent from the current literature. RESULTS: We found that white men were most likely to report a sense of belonging whereas women of color were the least likely. Further, we found that representation within one's STEM sub-discipline, namely biology versus the physical sciences, impacts sense of belonging for women. Four key factors were found to contribute to sense of belonging for all students interviewed: interpersonal relationships, perceived competence, personal interest, and science identity. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings indicate that students who remain in STEM majors report a greater sense of belonging than those who leave STEM. Additionally, we found that students from underrepresented groups are less likely to feel they belong. These findings highlight structural and cultural features of universities, as well as STEM curricula and pedagogy, that continue to privilege white males.

Collective pedagogical teacher culture, teacher-student ethno-racial mismatch, and teacher job satisfaction.

Teacher job satisfaction is critical to schools' successful functioning. Using a representative sample of kindergarten teachers from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, we investigate the association among professional learning community and teacher collaboration, teacher ethno-racial group, teacher-student ethno-racial mismatch, and teacher job satisfaction. We find that White teachers are significantly less satisfied than African-American and Latino teachers, especially when they teach in majority non-White classrooms. However, the existence of a professional community moderates the negative influence of teacher-student ethno-racial mismatch on White teachers' job satisfaction. In effect, strong professional communities serve as a cushion to bolster teacher job satisfaction.