The Long-Run Impacts of Same-Race Teachers

This study examines the impact of having a same-race teacher on students' long-run educational attainment. Leveraging random student-teacher pairings in the Tennessee STAR class-size experiment, the authors find that black students randomly assigned to a black teacher in grades K-3 are 5 percentage points (7%) more likely to graduate from high school and 4 percentage points (13%) more likely to enroll in college than their peers in the same school who are not assigned a black teacher. 

They also document similar patterns using quasi-experimental methods and statewide administrative data from North Carolina and provide suggestive evidence that role model effects help to explain why black teachers increase the educational attainment of black students.