Cross-national research finds that "shadow education"--educational activities outside of formal schooling--tends to confer advantages on already privileged students. Shadow education in the United States, such as test prep for college entrance exams, has received considerably less attention. Drawing on the National Education Longitudinal…

Claudia Buchmann, Dennis Condron and Vincent Roscigno's study, titled "Shadow Education, American Style: Test Preparation, the SAT and College Enrollment," demonstrates that vigorous use of expensive test preparation tools, such as private classes and tutors, significantly boosts scores on standardized exams such as the SAT or ACT. This…

The authors welcome and appreciate the comments of Eric Grodsky and Sigal Alon on their article "Shadow Education, American Style: Test Preparation, the SAT and College Enrollment." In their comments, Grodsky takes issue with several important theoretical and methodological aspects of their article and Alon highlights key processes…

Buchmann, Condron and Roscigno argue in their article, "Shadow Education, American Style: Test Preparation, the SAT and College Enrollment," that the activities in which students engage to prepare for college entrance exams are forms of shadow education, a means by which more advantaged parents seek to pass their privileged status along…

This study links the social capital literature with research on student mobility to investigate low test score performance among Mexican origin youth. Specifically, it examines whether Mexican Americans learn less in school than non-Latino Whites, in part because they have limited social capital due to the fact that they are more mobile during…