Differences in Teachers' Assessments of Students by English Learner Status
Maria Zhu
American Economic Association Papers & Proceedings, May 2024
This paper investigates potential disparities in how teachers perceive academic achievement between English Learner (EL) students and their non-EL counterparts.
Using data on elementary and middle school students in North Carolina, I compare teachers' academic assessments of EL students to those of non-EL students in the same class with the same standardized-test-based achievement.
Results reveal that teachers hold more negative perceptions of achievement for EL students compared to academically comparable non-EL peers. These results emphasize the added difficulties experienced by EL students in academic settings, compounding the challenges they already encounter from language barriers.
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