– The group of students who planned to major in STEM is more evenly split by gender (49 percent men and 51 percent women) compared with the group of students who did not plan to major in STEM (47 percent men and 53 percent women).
– The group that planned to major in STEM had fewer White and Hispanic students and more Black and Asian students than the group that did not plan to major in STEM.
– A significantly larger proportion of students who planned to major in STEM had taken Calculus as their highest math course in high school compared to those who did not plan to major in STEM.
– Women are 11 percentage points less likely to take calculus than men, and Asian students are nine percentage points more likely to take calculus than white students.
– A one-unit increase in SES composite is associated with a two-percentage-point increase in taking calculus.
– One percent increases in students’ reading and math scores and high school GPA are associated with four and 11 percentage-point increases in the likelihood of taking calculus, respectively.
– Students who planned to major in STEM as high school seniors were more likely to take calculus as were students entering a four-year private or public college (compared to entering a two-year college).
– There are no gender differences in the likelihood of failing among calculus takers.
– High SES students, as well as students with higher GPAs in high school, are less likely to fail.
– Students who directly enter a four-year college are more likely to fail than students who first entered a two-year college.
– Failing calculus is associated with a 12 percentage-point decrease in degree completion.
– Women who did not fail calculus are 32 percentage points more likely to receive a bachelor’s degree than women who failed calculus. Men’s likelihood of receiving a bachelor’s degree is not strongly tied to whether they pass calculus.
2017 - Weeded Out? Gendered Responses to Failing Calculus
Data are from the National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS:88) and the NELS Postsecondary Education Transcript Study (PETS:2000). To examine postsecondary education outcomes, the authors restricted the sample to the base-year through fourth follow-up studies, limiting the number of valid cases with a postsecondary transcript record to 7050 individuals.
DV: whether a student completed a bachelor’s degree, and whether they graduated with a bachelor’s degree in a STEM field (major is reported on the student’s transcript at collection)
IV: Failing a calculus course
Controls: race/ethnicity (non-Hispanic White, non-Hispanic Black, Hispanic, and Asian); gender; socioeconomic status (composite measure created by NELS; high school GPA (standardized); twelfth grade test score percentile ranks in both reading and math; whether students planned to major in STEM as high school students; highest math course taken while in high school; and whether the student’s primary institution was a public two-year, private not-for-profit four-year, or a public four-year institution.