Beyond Labels

A 360° Discussion of Foreign, National and Local Policy Issues

School outcomes, money, and race

This article in the NY Times deserves reading on a desktop — or maybe a tablet if there’s a way to hover over the bubbles to see what’s what.

In the upper right hand corner — the richest people and the best educational outcomes — are dominantly towns in Western Massachusetts — Concord, Carlyle, Acton, and so on.

There’s a search box, so you can see what schools in this region look like relative to the country as a whole.

The breakdown by race is interesting and prompts questions. Is the gap due to some institutional bias? Is it due to differences in IQ? And if so, are the differences due to environment, or are there genetic differences?

Lots of controversy on the IQ issue, summarized here.

 

1 Comment

  • Interesting article. Unfortunately, the graphs presented in the NY Times article are only in two dimensions (as they typically are), so it’s difficult to figure out what’s really going on. I agree with the professor from UC-Berkeley when he said “So we need to use that magnifying glass to figure out what the constellation of other factors” are that affect academics.

    Congrats to Blue Hill for being along the northwest edge of the scatter plot (high grade level relative to affluence); even more congrats to Bangor, which is less affluent and has a higher relative grade level (+1.2 vs +1.1 for Blue Hill).


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