Angel
Harris, an assistant professor of sociology and African American
studies, focuses his research on a rigorous exploration of the
educational achievement gap across racial and ethnic groups in the
United States. "In order to have more fruitful discourse and policy
ideas, we have to focus on explanations that have widespread empirical
support," said Harris, shown here in front of Stanhope Hall, the home
of Princeton's Center for African American Studies. (Photo: Brian
Wilson)
Below: Harris teaches a class on "Race,
Social Inequality and Education." "Professor Harris has definitely
changed the way I think about the achievement gap, but in some ways,
the effect has been disheartening," said one of his students, Alex
Barnard, noting that he had hoped there might be a single solution to
closing the gap. "Perhaps the most important thing I've learned in the
class is that no single remedy will prove to be a panacea."
(Photos: Denise Applewhite)
Web Stories
Harris seeks new insights into persistent achievement gap
by Hilary Parker · Posted June 19, 2008; 02:42 p.m.
From the June 16, 2008, Princeton Weekly Bulletin
Angel Harris
wants to change the way people think about the academic achievement gap
across racial and ethnic groups in the United States -- an issue that
he understands intimately, having struggled to make it through high
school himself.
Now an assistant professor of sociology and African American studies at Princeton, Harris is seeking to debunk current theories about the achievement gap that he has found to be implausible.
"It's a huge national issue," Harris said, noting that the gap in
academic skills and success between black and white students has a
significant impact on their earning potential as adults. The disparity
remains large, pervasive and persistent, with many black 12th-graders
typically performing on a level equivalent to many white
eighth-graders, according to Harris. Even using the most optimistic
predictions, the gap in reading abilities is expected to remain for at
least six decades and in terms of mathematics achievement is likely to
last even longer, perhaps a century, he said.
For Harris, the issue of why many black youths tend to lag in school is
personal as well. Once an underperforming high school student, he had
to be pushed into college by a friend's family, which ultimately
awakened his passion for education.
"Angel Harris has a high-quality and energetic research agenda in the
area of sociology of education, with a specific interest in the urgent
question of the achievement gap in primary and secondary education,"
said Valerie Smith, director of the Center for African American
Studies. "He is deeply committed to mentoring graduate and
undergraduate students alike, and he is dedicated to working on one of
the most pressing social policy issues we face as a nation."
In the past, explanations for the genesis of the gap have included
genetic differences in intelligence among racial groups, differences in
socioeconomic resources, biases in standardized testing and the idea of
"bad" culture. But the genetic hypothesis -- the subject of the
controversial 1994 bestseller "The Bell Curve" -- has been largely
dismissed as without merit, Harris noted. Resource differentials
account for only one-third of the gap and the difference in academic
achievement exists on many measures beyond standardized tests, he
added.
This leaves the idea of "bad" culture, or "oppositional culture
theory," which was first proposed by anthropologist John Uzo Ogbu in
1978. The theory, which is widely accepted in many academic circles,
purports that the markedly lower academic success of blacks, in
comparison to whites, is a result of black students' resistance to
schooling and intentionally sabotaging their educations in fear of
"acting white."
Using rigorous quantitative analyses of national data sets, Harris is
poking and prodding the theory from all sides, painstakingly teasing
apart a multitude of variables. Despite the pervasiveness of
oppositional culture theory in academic and mainstream discourse, he
has found no evidence for many of its predictions. For example, he has
sought to disprove the theory's suggestions that whites have better
preschool attitudes (he asserts the opposite is actually true) or that
misbehavior in school is the primary cause of black students' lower
academic achievement. Harris has published a number of articles on the
subject, including forthcoming papers in the journals Social Science
Quarterly and Sociology of Education.
"I
am surprised by how overwhelming the evidence is against this
framework," he said. "The dominant factor used to explain the
achievement gap is oppositional culture. It is time to look at other
explanations and not just focus on one thesis. In order to have more
fruitful discourse and policy ideas, we have to focus on explanations
that have widespread empirical support."
Humble beginnings
Raised
by his grandparents, Harris grew up in the projects of Brooklyn, N.Y.
He attended a local Catholic school from kindergarten through eighth
grade and entered the public system for his high school years at the
Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics in Harlem. At the time, he
was ranked in the bottom 20 percent of his class, and college was
nowhere on his radar screen.
"I was actually going to be a mortician," he said. "I figured it was a
way to be financially secure -- you'd never run out of business."
But his friend's twin aunts convinced him to apply to college during
his senior year of high school, and he half-heartedly filled out a few
applications. Much to his surprise, he was accepted by Grambling State
University, a historically black institution in Grambling, La. He had
no idea where Louisiana was, and he had no intention of enrolling at
Grambling after graduating high school in 1993.
But the aunts were persistent in encouraging Harris to attend college
-- so much so that they even drove him for 24 hours straight to
Grambling in their 1993 Crown Victoria. (It was Harris' first time on
an interstate.) When they arrived in Louisiana, the women dropped
Harris off with $30, a duffel bag of his belongings and all their best
wishes.
"It was the first time I ever left New York," Harris said. "Once I got
there, I realized what an opportunity I had. At Grambling, I
experienced firsthand how education can really change people's lives,
particularly if they're coming from a lower socioeconomic background. I
wanted to know why some people are able to succeed while others are
not."
After earning his bachelor's degree in psychology at Grambling, Harris
went on to receive his master's degree in sociology at Kansas State
University and his Ph.D. in public policy and sociology from the
University of Michigan.
After one year as an assistant professor at the University of Texas-Austin, in 2007 Harris joined the Princeton faculty.
Changing the discourse
At
a recent meeting of Harris' course, "Race, Social Inequality and
Education," a student asked Harris about his research agenda.
"I want to change the discourse," Harris responded. "It's important to
change how problems are conceived -- that is just as important as
policy itself and will lead to different policy decisions in the
future."
Alex Barnard, a junior sociology major, was drawn to the course because he sought new perspectives on the achievement gap.
"Professor Harris has definitely changed the way I think about the
achievement gap, but in some ways, the effect has been disheartening,"
Barnard said, noting that he had hoped there might be a single solution
to closing the gap. "Perhaps the most important thing I've learned in
the class is that no single remedy will prove to be a panacea."
Harris is currently developing alternate explanations to oppositional
culture theory to explain the achievement gap. For example, he has
demonstrated that differences in skills acquired at an early age,
rather than misbehavior in the classroom, may be a major factor causing
the lower academic success of some blacks. These differences in prior
academic skills, which are largely related to race, account for 70
percent of the achievement gap observed in high schools across America,
while differences in schooling behaviors contribute to only 13 percent
of the difference in achievement between blacks and whites, he said.
Next, Harris intends to probe the reasons for the skills disparity --
exploring whether people who value education for different reasons have
particular parenting styles that may influence the academic success of
their children.
"If
one parent thinks education is important only because it's a means to
an end, like buying a house, they're more likely to focus on whether or
not assignments are complete. Someone else who believes in the
intrinsic value of knowledge is more likely to focus on whether their
child understands the material," he said.
Though his hypothesis is "still largely in the realm of speculation,"
Harris suspects that the children of parents who value education
intrinsically will develop far greater academic skills.
"If this difference in skills develops at the first- or second-grade
level, the achievement gap is just going to snowball as time goes on,"
he said.
This methodical approach to sociological problems is a hallmark of
Harris' research, according to his colleague Marta Tienda, the Maurice
P. During Professor in Demographic Studies and professor of sociology
and public affairs.
Tienda and Harris are currently collaborating on work to explore the
top 10 percent law in Texas, which guarantees admission to state
universities to students who graduated in the top 10 percent of their
high school class. Tienda and Harris seek to determine why the law has
been less effective than affirmative action with regard to the number
of Hispanics enrolling in college.
"I've been impressed by the clarity of Angel's approach and thinking
about problems," Tienda said. "He devises unique ways of adding value
to questions that others have addressed. By the time Angel is finished
with a problem, you know the case is closed."
