"College Acceleration for All? Mapping Racial Gaps in Advanced Placement and Dual Enrollment Participation"

​Associate Professor Di Xu (right) is first author, with alumna Sabrina Solanki (Ph.D. ’19, postdoctoral researcher at the University of Michigan) and Columbia University senior research associate John Fink, of an article in the American Educational Association Research Journal exploring high school level college acceleration courses.
 
The title of the article is “College Acceleration for All? Mapping Racial Gaps in Advanced Placement and Dual Enrollment Participation.”
 
Xu researches economic returns to higher education, financial aid to higher education, and effects of governmental policies and projects on educational equity and efficiency​. She has conducted several national studies of student performance in online vs. face-to-face instruction, especially in community colleges, and the instructional factors that help students’ success in online classes. In 2018, Xu was awarded a five-year CAREER grant from the National Science Foundation to explore ways to improve online learning at community colleges.

​Abstract
 
This article documents the patterns of White-Black and White-Hispanic enrollment gaps in Advanced Placement (AP) and Dual Enrollment (DE) programs across thousands of school districts in the United States by merging several data sources. We show that the vast majority of districts have racial enrollment gaps in both programs, with wider gaps in AP than DE. Results from fractional regression models indicate that geographic variations in these gaps can be explained by both local and state factors. We also find that district-level resources and state policies that provide greater access to AP and DE are also associated with wider racial enrollment gaps, implying that greater resources may engender racial disparity without adequate efforts to provide equitable access and support for minority students.