Who Takes Advanced Placement (AP)?

Department

Economics, Finance and Quantitative Analysis

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

5-27-2015

Abstract

This paper provides an analysis of who takes Advanced Placement (AP) Economics. We find large differences in enrollment in AP Economics across groups. Specifically, African-American and Hispanic students and students from low-income backgrounds are about half as likely to be enrolled in AP Economics as other students. However, once we control for prior academic achievement in Geometry, African-American and Hispanic students are overrepresented relative to whites and the difference between low-income and other students is reduced significantly. Female students are overrepresented relative to males, and Asian students are overrepresented relative to whites — this latter effect is large.

Journal Title

Eastern Economic Journal

Journal ISSN

0094-5056

Volume

41

Issue

3

First Page

346

Last Page

369

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

10.1057/eej.2014.21

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