The Opportunity Gap: Is Your State Providing Equal Access to Education?

By Jennifer LaFleur, Al Shaw, Sharona Coutts and Jeff Larson, ProPublica, June 30, 2011

ProPublica analyzed new data from the U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights along with other federal education data to examine whether states provide students equal access to programs — such as Advanced Placement or higher-level math and sciences classes — that researchers say will help them later in life. We found that in some states, high-poverty schools are less likely than wealthier schools to have students enrolled those programs.

This data includes all schools and districts where the district has at least 3,000 students. That covers roughly three-quarters of all public school students. For more information on how we analyzed this data, check out our detailed methodology.

Explore below to see whether your state, school and district provide access to those key classes. Related Story: Some States Still Leave Low-Income Students Behind; Others Make Surprising Gains

ProPublica intern Sergio Hernandez contributed research to this project.

LINK: How States Compare

LINK: Hawaii Equal Access?  (Hawaii ranks high on equality, low on results)

Success Story: Florida (Florida ranks high on equality, high on results)

High Inequality: Kansas (Kansas ranks low on equality, low on results)