This figure shows point estimates from within-student fixed-effect regressions for the full sample and sub-samples by 8th grade GPA bins and racial/ethnic identity groups. All point estimates are near the overall coefficient of 0.19 grade points and are statistically significant.

This figure shows point estimates from within-student fixed-effect regressions for the full sample and sub-samples by gender identity, Special Education enrollment status and Emergent bilingual (EL) status. All point estimates are near the overall coefficient of 0.19 grade points and are statistically significant.

Importantly, *all* students, not just specific demographic groups experienced GPA benefits.

Every student group we examined – across race/ethnicity, gender, special education status, and Emergent Bilingual status – showed positive effects.

Some good news:

SFUSD's high school Ethnic Studies course has substantial academic benefits when implemented district-wide.

New research by @birajbisht.bsky.social, Sade Bonilla, Grace Kim, and myself just out today in @aeraedresearch.bsky.social
🧵

doi.org/10.3102/0002...

How Texas plans to tie school accountability grades to college success, job wages

kinder.rice.edu/urbanedge/ho...

Texas students see unequal payoff in college, career prep Students who took English and math college prep courses were less likely to complete college than their peers who were not considered college ready at all.

Not all paths to college and career readiness pay off equally for Texas students, study finds www.texastribune.org/2026/02/23/t...

9/ ⚠️ Access note

This article was supposed to be open access, but Sage did not post it that way. If you want a copy, message or email me and I’ll send it.

8/ 🙏 Thanks

Grateful to Erin Baumgartner for early input as the broader STEM project developed, and to Houston ISD staff who encouraged research on the geography of educational opportunity.

7/ 📎 Definitely check out the appendix

It includes:
• detailed data + methods
• alternative STEM-desert definitions
• robustness checks
• limitations + implications

6/ 🧩 Why this matters for policy

When STEM curricula are unevenly distributed across schools, students may need to travel farther—or abandon preferred STEM trajectories entirely. Geography can quietly function as a gatekeeper of opportunity.

5/ 📊 Key disparities

Students more likely to live in STEM deserts:

• Black students (+11–12 pp)
• Asian/Pacific Islander students (+3–6 pp)
• Students from non-English-speaking households (+1–5 pp)
• Students in lower-SES neighborhoods

4/ 🏫 Using administrative data from Houston ISD (N=28,083), we measured:

• # of STEM course options within 2 miles
• # of STEM curricular paths nearby

Students in the bottom quartile of access were classified as living in a STEM desert.

3/ 🧭 Why geography matters

Educational opportunity is spatially structured. Long-standing patterns like residential segregation and neighborhood inequality shape which academic options students can realistically access.

2/ 📍 What is a STEM desert?

STEM deserts are places where students have few school-based opportunities to pursue a STEM curriculum. Prior work measured access at large geographic levels—but we measure it locally, based on what’s actually available near each student’s home.

STEM deserts, similar to education deserts, are rural, suburban, and urban areas where students have limited access to school-based STEM curriculum and coursework opportunities. Using administrative data from the Houston Independent School District following a state policy change to high school graduation requirements, this study develops measures of STEM deserts and identifies the students most likely to live in them. Findings reveal that Black and Asian/Pacific Islander students, students from non-English-speaking households, and those from lower socioeconomic neighborhoods are disproportionately likely to live in STEM deserts compared to White students, students from English-speaking households, and those from higher socioeconomic neighborhoods.

1/ 🚨 New publication in Educational Researcher

"Who Lives in a STEM Desert?"

🔗: doi.org/10.3102/0013...

We introduce student-level measures of “STEM deserts”—areas where students have limited nearby access to STEM courses and curricular pathways.

#STEM #EdPolicy #Equity

Summer Melt and the Postsecondary Pathway: https://osf.io/zkd9h

College Enrollment Patterns After SFFA v. Harvard We study how U.S. high school students’ patterns of college entry changed in the first year after the Supreme Court’s 2023 SFFA v. Harvard ruling. Drawing on a rich dataset linking more than 12 millio...

"high-achieving underrepresented minority college-goers were up to 10 percentage points less likely to enroll in highly selective colleges... “cascading” down the college selectivity distribution into less selective colleges with lower graduation rates and earnings." edworkingpapers.com/ai26-1392

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

New study: Drawing on categorical inequality concepts & leveled tracking, this study explores how EL labeling limits access to college-level course-taking; finding differences in postsecondary outcomes vary by reclassification timing & disparities in college-level coursework.https://buff.ly/lPeK4G8

Our paper, “EMERGEing Educational Opportunities,” is now assigned to an issue in Education Finance & Policy. First online in summer 2025, it uses sharp RD to estimate effects of intensive advising on selective college outcomes for high-achieving, low-SES students.

doi.org/10.1162/edfp...

9/
🙏 We thank Kinder Institute staff (Erin Baumgartner, Ruth Turley) for supporting this project from its inception. In particular, we're grateful to Ruth for reviewing the 1st draft & encouraging us on the implications section, which we hope serves as an agenda for future research.

8/
💡 Policy implication:
EL classification can unintentionally function as a tracking mechanism, constraining access to college-level coursework. Supporting EL students so they have greater access to AP/IB/dual credit pipelines sooner may expand postsecondary opportunity.

7/
📊 In decomposition analyses, differences in college-level course-taking explain meaningful portions of EL–never-EL gaps in college enrollment and completion, indicating that reclassification timing has downstream influences on curricular & postsecondary access.

6/
📚 College-level coursework is an important part of the story:
Students reclassified in high school take fewer AP/IB/dual credit courses than never-EL or elementary-reclassified peers.

5/
🎓 Key descriptive pattern:
EL gaps in 4-year enrollment and B.A. completion are largest among students reclassified later (middle/high school). Early reclassification is associated with outcomes closer to never-EL peers.

4/
🏫 Using longitudinal data from the Houston Independent School District, we follow students from high school through 6 years post-graduation and disaggregate EL students by timing of reclassification (never EL, elementary, middle, high).

3/
🎯 Why this matters:
AP/IB/dual credit participation is strongly predictive of college enrollment and completion, yet we know little about how EL students navigate these pipelines.

2/
👨‍🎓 We examine how English learner (EL) status shapes access to college-level coursework (AP, IB, dual credit) in high school—and how this contributes to postsecondary enrollment and completion gaps.

Drawing from frameworks of categorical inequality and leveled tracking, this study examines how English learners (EL) status serves as a label that limits students’ access to college-level course-taking in high school and subsequent postsecondary opportunities. We find that EL–never-EL gaps in postsecondary outcomes vary by the timing of reclassification but are largely explained by student and school factors. We also show that ELs reclassified in later grades take fewer college-level courses than both never-EL students and ELs reclassified earlier. Nonlinear variance decomposition analyses reveal that a substantial portion of these outcome gaps is attributable to differences in college-level course-taking. We conclude by sharing insights from district staff to help schools support EL students in completing college-level coursework and expanding their postsecondary opportunities.

1/
🚨 New article out in Educational Evaluation & Policy Analysis

“Sorted and Tracked: English Learners, College-Level Course-Taking in High School, and Postsecondary Opportunity”

🔗: doi.org/10.3102/0162... (open access!)

#SocEd #HigherEd #EdPolicy #EL

Digital incentives increase parent survey participation, but language matters. Higher incentives and clearer options lead to more equitable engagement, from Kalena Cortes, Brian Holzman, Melissa D. Gentry, and Miranda I. Lambert www.nber.org/papers/w34653

Texas college completion rises, low-income students left behind Economically disadvantaged students are much less likely to go on and attain degrees, according to new state data that tracks long-term outcomes.

The same old story about the intractability of poverty—and the uphill efforts of those who help students work past it—needs retelling in as many ways as we can.
www.texastribune.org/2025/12/18/t...

Texas college completion rises, low-income students left behind Economically disadvantaged students are much less likely to go on and attain degrees, according to new state data that tracks long-term outcomes.

More Texas students complete journey through college, but low-income students still left behind.

Texas school district higher education outcomes lookup Newly-released state data tracked the long-term outcomes of public school students who enrolled a decade ago.

Texas tracks the long-term outcomes of public school students. See how your school district compares here.