Racial disparities persist on exams

Keach Hagey:

There was not one black student in an Advanced Placement course at Greenwich High School last year, despite the fact that nearly half of the senior class took such courses.

Only 50 percent of black students and 58 percent of Hispanic students took the SAT during the 2003-04 school year, compared with 95 percent of Asian and 92 percent of white students.

District administrators say such figures, which show participation in voluntary college preparations, reveal a significant and persistent achievement gap between the Greenwich Public Schools' white, Asian and affluent students and their black, Hispanic and less affluent peers that has been a concern for years. This school year, educators and community representatives have formed a new committee to define and begin closing the gap.

After meeting five times since forming in May, the Committee to Close the Achievement Gap delivered its first report to the Board of Education last week. "The striking thing that we're finding is the consistency of the gap over time," said John Curtin, the district's assistant to the superintendent for curriculum, research and evaluation, who is co-chairing the committee. "The same gaps exist that existed during the last five years."

The gaps begin early in students' academic careers and persist through high school, according to the report. The district tracks them using scores from state-mandated exams -- including the Connecticut Mastery Test, administered in grades three through eight, and the Connecticut Academic Performance Test, administered to high school sophomores -- and participation in the SAT and AP classes.

They break down the data from these measures by race, gender, program (English as a Second Language and Special Education) and socioeconomic status (students who qualify for free or reduced-price lunch). Last year, the district's students were 2.5 percent black, 11.9 percent Hispanic, 8.1 percent Asian and 77.5 percent white.

Just over 11 percent of students received special education services, 6.8 percent were enrolled in English as a Second Language and 7.7 percent qualified for free or reduced-price lunch.

According to trends that have held steady for the last five years, white students are 70 percent more likely to score at the mastery level on the CMT than black students and 40 percent more likely than Hispanic students. Students who qualify for free or reduced lunch are half as likely to score at mastery level on the CMT as other students.

In high school, black and Hispanic students are three times as likely to score at the basic or below basic level on the CAPT than white students. Students receiving services from special education or English as a Second Language programs are three times as likely to score at the basic or below basic level on CAPT as other students.

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