Owen's (2025) study finds increasing AP courses mainly benefits non-disadvantaged, White, Asian, & higher-achieving students, worsening disparities. There's little evidence more AP opportunities improve outcomes, except for top students. AP expansion should include equity supports, not just access.

LPI research by Fitz & Price (2025) highlights how classrooms can enhance equity in math. It emphasizes belonging, growth mindset, and quality instruction, linking developmental needs with systemic barriers like tracking and access to adv courses, crucial for reforming math ed so all students succeed.

Templeton & Korchagin (2025) use a stratification economics lens to highlight how racial disparities in K-12 ed stem more from systemic structures that reinforce racial & economic hierarchies than from individual choices or cultural factors. Essential for understanding tracking.

Pomeroy & Quaye's article on How secondary mathematics teachers describe and teach ‘ability’ groups: discursive and non-discursive practices.

A new summary breaks down a study by Daniel Vargas Castaño, Dareem K. Antoine, and Trey Miller on the early effects of Dallas ISD’s opt-out policy for advanced math.

What does ability grouping look like in Australian secondary schools? Johnston and colleagues (2025) reveal deep variation and raises urgent questions about tracking’s reach across subjects, years, and regions.

What does it take for teachers to move away from fixed ability grouping? Wright and Forrester (2025) follow primary teachers in England as they reflect on their practice, challenge labels, and shift toward more equitable math instruction.

Fish et al. (2025) critiques research suggesting Black students are under-identified for special education and warns against oversimplified interpretations. Authors call for caution, better data, and more nuanced inquiry into racial disproportionality.

We have moved to BlueSky! Check our BlueSky for our recommendations for recent tracking and de-tracking research and reports.

Current Social Media Account: Access, Detracking, and Tracking on BlueSky

Previous Social Media Account: Tracking and Detracking SIG on X

District Leadership for Racial Equity: Lessons From School Systems That Are Closing the Gap LPI's 'District Leadership for Racial Equity' profiles four school leaders who disrupted disparities and improved outcomes for historically marginalized students. Cases show how change is possible when leaders build capacity & commit to equity & opportunity for all students. This book is available FREE as an open access ebook or for purchase as a physical book.

Reimagining School Integration: Possibilities for the Future. In Reimagining School Integration: Possibilities for the Future, SIG Member and Professor Allison Roda authors a chapter titled, “Illusions of Racial Equity in Desegregated Schools: Deconstructing and Reconstructing the Hidden Tracking Political Machine to Achieve Integration.” You can find the link to the book for purchase here.

Classroom Detracking in the US: Examples for School Leadership New research by our SIG Chair, Dr. Margaret Thornton delves into one school’s struggle to balance detracking and student support. Thornton offers valuable insights and poses critical questions for educators using a social justice lens.    You can find a link to the book here and Peter Piazza’s (@PeterTPiazza) post about Dr. Thornton’s new research on the School Diversity Notebook.

Schooled and Sorted is a compelling and thoughtful exploration of the genesis, purpose, nature, and use of educational categories and the profound and lasting impact they have on the lives of students and society’s social order. The authors provide insights into the connections between the processes and types of educational categorization and societal and educational inequality. The book raises questions and offers suggestions about how we can work collaboratively to reevaluate educational systems and build a more just, equitable, and inclusive society. You can find more information and purchase the book here or here to support local bookstores.

 

 

Featuring our own SIG members, Donna Harris, Sean Kelly, Carol Burris, Kevin Welner, and Maika Watanabe!  If you know of, or have written, a recent tracking-related paper that is not listed here, please send it to Emily Hodge so we can provide a comprehensive list.

(Papers listed are from the last six years, beginning with the most recent.)

Kanno, Y., & Kangas, S. (2014). "I'm not going to be, like, for the AP": English Language Learners' limited access to advanced college-preparatory courses in high school. American Educational Research Journal. 51(5), 848-878.

Domina, T., Penner, A. M., Penner, E. K. & Conley, A. (2014). Algebra for all: California’s eighth-grade Algebra initiative as constrained curricula. Teachers College Record. 116 (8), 1-18. 


Godley, A. (2013). "Equivocal Equity: The Struggles of a Literacy Scholar, White Middle-Class Urban School Parent, and Grassroots Activist. Research in the Teaching of English. 48(2), 250–260.

Conger, D., & Long, M. C. (2013). Gender gaps in college enrollment:  The role of gender sorting across public high schools. Educational Researcher, 42(7), 371–380.

Chmielewski, A.K., Dumont, H., & Trautwein, U. (2013). "Tracking effects depend on tracking type: An international comparison of students’ mathematics self-concept."American Educational Research Journal, 50(5), 925–957.

Kalogrides, D., & Loeb, S. (2013). "Different teacher, different peers: The magnitude of student sorting within schools." Educational Researcher, 42(6), 304–316. 

Nomi, T., & Allensworth, E.M. (2013). "Sorting and supporting: Why double-dose algebra led to higher test scores but more score failures." American Educational Research Journal, 30(4), 756–788.

Kalogrides, D., Loeb, S., & Beteille, T. (2013). Systematic sorting, teacher characteristics, and class assignments. Sociology of Education, 86(2), 103-123.

Gritter, K. (2012). Permeable textual discussion in tracked language arts classrooms. Research in the Teaching of English, 46(3), 232–259.

Harris, D. M. (2012). Varying teacher expectations and standards: Curriculum differentiation in the age of standards-based reform. Education and Urban Society, 44(2), 128–150.

Harris, Donna M. (2011). Curriculum differentiation and comprehensive school reform: Challenges in providing educational opportunity. Educational Policy, 25(5), 844–884.

Kelly, S., & Price, H. (2011). The correlates of tracking policy: Opportunity hoarding, status competition, or a technical-functional explanation? American Educational Research Journal, 48(3), 560–585.

Buttaro, A., Catsambis, S., Mulkey, L., & Steelman, L. C. (2010). An organizational perspective on the origins of instructional segregation: School composition and use of within-class ability grouping in American kindergartens. Teachers College Record, 112(5), 1300–1337.

Burris, C. C., Welner, K. G., & Bezoza, J. W. (2009). Universal access to a quality education: Research and recommendations for the elimination of curricular stratification. Boulder and Tempe: Education and the Public Interest Center & Education Policy Research Unit.

Gamoran, A. (2009). Tracking and inequality: New directions for research and practice. WCER Working Paper No. 2009-6. Madison: Wisconsin Center for Education Research.

Lleras, Christy, & Rangel, C. (2009). Ability grouping practices in elementary school and African American/Hispanic achievement. American Journal of Education, 115(2), 279–304.

Boaler, J., & Staples, M. (2008). Creating mathematical futures through an equitable teaching approach: The case of Railside School. Teachers College Record, 110(3), 608–645.

Burris, C. C., Wiley, E., Welner, K., & Murphy, J. (2008). Accountability, rigor, and detracking: Achievement effects of embracing a challenging curriculum as a universal good for all students. Teachers College Record, 110(3), 571–607.

Lleras, C. (2008). Race, racial concentration, and the dynamics of educational inequality across urban and suburban schools. American Educational Research Journal, 45(4), 886–912.

Mickelson, R. A., & Everett, B. J.(2008). Neotracking in North Carolina: How high school courses of study reproduce race and class-based stratification. Teachers College Record, 110(3), 535–570.

Rubin, B. (2008). Detracking in context: How local constructions of ability complicate equity-geared reform. Teachers College Record, 110(3), 646–699.

Watanabe, M. (2008). Tracking in the era of high-stakes state accountability reform: Case studies of classroom instruction in North Carolina. Teachers College Record, 110(3), 489–534.

Harrison, C. (2013). Teachers’ construction of expectations and adaptation of practice in response to ability grouping, labels, and performance data. Paper presented at the 2013 Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, CA.

Hedrick, B. & Baldinger, E. (2013). Beliefs about tracking: Comparing American and Finnish prospective mathematics teachers. Paper presented at the 2013 Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, CA.

Hinkson-Lee, K. (2013). Academic tracking: A contradiction to proficiency for all. Paper presented at the 2013 Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, CA.