- Mother’s expectations are immensely powerful and explain the Asian and Hispanic effect and a good portion of the Black effect on student’s degree expectation.
- Race, ethnicity, gender, SES and high school composition significantly interact with test scores. Being Asian has a positive effect on the NELS mathematics test but not on the NELS reading tests. However, being Black, Hispanic, and American Indian all negatively effect student test scores.
- Being male had a positive effect on the math test but a negative effect on the reading test.
- Being male reduces the odds of one attaining a bachelor’s degree or higher.
- There was no effect on degree attainment, as far as being a minority in a high percentage minority school, yet there was an effect of the percent receiving free or reduced lunch.
- There was a race+percent race interaction effect on attending a two-year college. Being Hispanic in a high percentage Asian school had a negative effect on two-year college attendance, while being Black at both a high percentage Hispanic and a high percentage Black school also decreased students odds of attending a community college.
- No positive effect between race and degree expectations on degree attainment was found.
- This study supported the findings of the both the NCES (2001) and Rosenbaum(2001) that being Black, net of several factors, does have a positive effect and statistically influences degree attainment. Though being Black is ultimately explained by students’ degree expectations, it is important to note that there is a system in place that is working to some degree.
- School SES has a positive effect and school minority composition has a negative effect on grades only in the case of foreign-born Latinos.
- Race, gender, and SES matter in terms of both analysis of achievement and attainment, when only SES mattered in prior studies.
- The paradox of Black expectations and attainment disappears when Black abstract expectations are compared to their academic achievement absent of other contextual variables.