The role of gender in academic achievement

This article focuses on findings from a study involving 30 highly successful, low‐income, African American public high school students. The students’ gender‐based experiences defy the traditional patterns of educational underachievement associated with this minority group. They challenge John Ogbu’s influential notions of ‘involuntary’ minority students as oppositional and resistant to schooling. Moreover, the strong gender‐based variation found among these students in terms of their college aspirations and strategies for attaining success raise questions about an undifferentiated treatment of the African American student population. School practices, peer interactions and students’ lived familial and community experiences are crucial factors in shaping educational outcomes. The intertwining of school, family and community cultures constructs gendered attitudes and beliefs. Even when students share a racial and class identity, gender may strongly mediate their perceptions and behavior, in and out of school.