- Social background explains much of students’ initial track placement which occurs in the sixth grade.
- African American students were less likely to be in advanced English and mathematics than were otherwise comparable White student. They were also more likely to be in remedial than in regular mathematics, even when academic history and educational expectations were controlled
- The only academic factor that strongly influenced initial middle school placements was fifth-grade standardized test score.
- Enrollment in advanced-level courses continues to be socially patterned in the eighth grade, as it was in the sixth grade, but there is little evidence of strong social-background patterns in remedial placements.
- By the eighth grade, social- background differences in mathematics are almost entirely hidden by their strong association with sixth-grade placements and by the stability in placements throughout middle school.