Race and Sex Influences in the Schooling Processes of Rural and Small Town Youth

This paper assesses how race and sex act to determine the educational performance and career aspirations of over 3,000 students enrolled in 23 public schools in Mississippi. The data, collected in 1972, pertain to the schooling experiences of small town and rural students. The results strongly support the conclusions of Wisconsin researchers and others concerning the dynamics of early achievement processes for whites. Moreover, we find that even as of 1972 social origins, academic aptitude, and academic performance facilitated or retarded subsequent interpersonal and aspirational outcomes differently for whites of the two sexes. The Wisconsin model, moreover, yields much poorer explanations of ambition among blacks of both sexes and sex differences among blacks are smaller than they are for whites. A major difference by race is that career expectations of blacks depend less on status origins than those of whites.