The Race Gap in Student Achievement Scores: Longitudinal Evidence from a Racially Diverse School District

Black and Hispanic students often display substantial gaps in test scores when compared to White students at all levels of education. In this article, we examine when and how the Black‐White and Hispanic‐White test score gaps develop in the early elementary grades in a California school district with a large minority population, where more than 80% of the students are Black or Hispanic. We use multivariate analysis to predict the annual reading and math test scores of a student cohort from first through fourth grade controlling for various school and family factors. We find that in this racially diverse school district achievement gaps do develop, for both Black and Hispanic students. However, in comparison to the Black‐White achievement gaps, the Hispanic‐White gaps develop later, in particular in math, and they are half the size of the Black‐White achievement gaps. The eventual widening of the gaps for Hispanic and Black students does not seem to be the result of minority students attending schools of less quality. Finally, in contrast to previous studies with fewer minorities, the estimated achievement gaps by the fourth grade are small. 1