Not Separate and Not Equal? Achievement and Attainment Equity in College Towns

Robert Maranto and Jeffery Dean

Social Science Quarterly, 2015, vol. 96, issue 4, 985-995

Abstract: type="main">

A vast literature documents unequal outcomes in American public education (e.g., Duncan and Murname, 2011), but no prior research explores whether inequities are moderated in progressive communities such as college towns. We test whether college towns have more equal educational outcomes than similar communities that lack higher education institutions.

We conduct two tests. First, we employ cross-sectional ordinary least squares (OLS) regression predicting high school graduation (attainment) rates in 8,841 school districts, including 184 college town districts, with data taken from the U.S. Department of Education's Common Core of Data. Since attainment is a blunt measure, we also use OLS regression to predict test score (achievement) results in Pennsylvania, a state with a large number of college town school districts.

Nationally, controlling for a range of characteristics, college towns have slightly but significantly lower attainment rates. Regarding achievement, low-income students in Pennsylvania college towns are at a slight disadvantage in math achievement compared to low-income students elsewhere.

We find some evidence that college towns have less equal educational outcomes and speculate as to causes, with the caveat that given the modest statistical impacts found, more research is needed.

Date: 2015
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