Who Believes in Me? The Effect of Student-Teacher Demographic Match on Teacher Expectations

Seth Gershenson, Stephen Holt and Nicholas Papageorge

No 15-231, Upjohn Working Papers from W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research

Abstract: Teachers are an important source of information for traditionally disadvantaged students. However, little is known about how teachers form expectations and whether they are systematically biased. We investigate whether student-teacher demographic mismatch affects high school teachers' expectations for students' educational attainment. Using a student fixed effects strategy that exploits expectations data from two teachers per student, we find that non-black teachers of black students have significantly lower expectations than do black teachers. These effects are larger for black male students and math teachers. Our findings add to a growing literature on the role of limited information in perpetuating educational attainment gaps.

Keywords: Educational Attainment; Expectations; Stigmatization; Mismatch (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D84 I24 J15 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-ger and nep-ure
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (19)

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Working Paper: Who Believes in Me? The Effect of Student-Teacher Demographic Match on Teacher Expectations (2015)
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