"Tracking" harms many students.

A study on tracking in high schools shows the system of placing some students in college preparatory courses and others in easier math and science courses is "harming millions of students in American society," notes Sanford Dornbusch, the Reed-Hodgson Professor of Human Biology, Stanford University, and president of the Society for Research on Adolescence. Tracking doesn't limit opportunities for the top tenth or so of students, but is particularly disastrous for those whose abilities fall in the middle range, Dornbusch indicates.

Eighth-grade test scores are critical to students' high school placement, yet many who do well on those exams--particularly Latinos and African-Americans--are misplaced in courses below their abilities, as are about 20% of whites who aspire to go to four-year colleges. The researchers found that the proportion of high-ability black and Hispanic students not taking college prep courses in math and science was more than twice that of whites and Asian-Americans of the same ability level. "At minimum, more students should be in higher tracks."

The study found that those who intend to go to college and their parents often don't know when a student has been tracked out of college-preparatory science and math classes. Biology courses with names like 'Ecology and You" or "Life on Earth" hide the fact that they will not prepare someone for admission to a...