Objective: The beginning of college marks a decline in physical activity and racial/ethnic minorities have disproportionately lower rates of physical activity. This study examined the association between perceived stress and physical activity among an ethnically diverse sample of college-attending young adults. Participants: 2,396 students (36%…

The performance of White students and Hispanic students from California, Texas, and Arizona on the advanced placement (AP) biology exam was compared using archival data from the College Board from 2016 through 2019. Pearson Chi-square tests yielded statistically significant differences in all 4 year comparisons of white and Hispanic students in…

Neoliberal advocates frame school choice as the solution to the many issues plaguing public schools, including not meeting state standards, the opportunity gap, and disengagement. This market-driven approach makes school reputation--ideas continuously made and remade about schools dependent on perceptions or experiences--a critical dimension that…

Among the many inequalities associated with racial segregation in schools, one notable disparity is the unequal access to experienced teachers. Schools with high proportions of Black or Latinx students have a disproportionate share of inexperienced teachers, both throughout the nation and in California specifically (Clotfelter, Ladd, &…

Food insecurity is widespread among college students in the United States. Food benefits delivered through the CalFresh program, California's version of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), can reduce hunger by helping students pay for groceries, but may not reach all eligible students. To date, higher education systems…

Conceptualizing and measuring trends in segregation in higher education is difficult as both vertical and horizontal sorting is prevalent and patterns vary across racial groups. In this paper, we measure various trends in racial segregation in California for 20 years. We find significant sorting by race both between and within sectors of higher…

School boards remain one of the most powerful forces in American education, helping to set curricula, evaluate teachers, and direct hundreds of billions of dollars in education funding. Yet teachers' unions play an outsized role in determining who serves on these boards. If the interests of teachers are perfectly aligned with those of students,…

Teachers of color increase school success for students of color. Yet, little attention has been paid to whether school attendance behaviors also increase from same race and ethnicity matches. To address this, our study used administrative data provided by a California high school district for the school years 2014 to 2018. We explored student…

This study built upon research examining the effects of diversity in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) fields and higher education by investigating the relationship between student perceptions of campus diversity and classroom engagement for first- and second-year Latinx and White students at two structurally diverse…

While teaching summer school may require similar skills as reading intervention during the year, rarely are summer school instructors reading specialists. To support these instructors providing high quality instruction, this research study examined the impact of the 95 Phonics Booster Bundle: Summer School Edition (SSE). The SSE is a set of 25…

Research has shown elevated rates of peer victimization among transgender youth in schools, placing them at risk of an array of negative social and psychological outcomes well into adulthood. We conducted a secondary analysis of the 2015-2016 California Healthy Kids Survey to examine rates of physical victimization (physical acts such as being…

The present study examined whether high school students' (N = 1,658) self-reported social-emotional strengths collected at the beginning of the school year via schoolwide screening could predict student membership in one of three truancy categories (low, moderate, and high to chronic truancy) using discriminant analysis. Results indicated that…

Promise programs are proliferating across the United States, with wide variation in their design. Using national data on 33 Promise programs affecting single, 2-year colleges, this study examines program effects on first-time, full-time college enrollments of students by race/ethnicity and gender classification. Results suggest Promise programs…

Conversations about digital inequality in education often revolve around access to technology. However, research into youth culture has shown that many Black and Latinx teens are able to access technology and have developed the same digital skills as their white peers. Social scientist Matt Rafalow observed three California middle schools where…

To explore the role of teachers' biases in the underrepresentation of minorities and women in STEM, 128 secondary science teachers were asked to evaluate responses spoken with either falling or rising intonation by African American, Latino, and White ninth-grade boys and girls. Responses spoken by minority students were evaluated less favorably…