Oakland, CA–March 3, 2008. Mills College researchers have found an educational disparity among young voters that helps to explain the unequal voting rates of youth in the 2008 presidential primaries.

Exit polls from February's Super Tuesday revealed that one in four college-educated youths voted in the primaries compared with only one in 14 eligible young voters with no college experience. Exit polls also showed that almost 80 percent of the primaries' voters ages 18 to 29 had attended college when only half of Americans in the same age group have attended college.

"The overall rise in young Americans voting this primary season has been remarkable, but it's disproportionately among well-educated young people," said Peter Levine, director of the Maryland-based Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Education, which released the exit poll results last week.

A new Mills College study shows that this disparity in education happens as early as in high school. In Democracy for Some: The Civic Opportunity Gap in High School Joseph Kahne and Ellen Middaugh of the Civic Engagement Research Group at Mills College find that access to education about politics and citizenship depends on a student's wealth, academic skills, and race.

"Students in higher income school districts are up to twice as likely as those from average income districts to learn how laws are made and how Congress works, and they are one-and-a-half times as likely to have political debates and panel discussions in their classrooms," said Kahne, director of research of the Civic Engagement Research Group and dean of the School of Education at Mills College.

The research also showed that African American students are less likely than white students to have civics classes, discuss current events, and to participate in simulations of civic processes. Latino students reported fewer opportunities to volunteer, participate in simulations, and have discussions in an open classroom climate.

The Mills team analyzed a nationally representative sample of 2,811 ninth graders at 124 schools nationwide and a survey that included more than 2,500 California high school juniors and seniors from 2005 to 2007.

"Schools should not offer opportunities to develop a civic and political voice on the basis of race, income or academic standing," said Kahne. "School systems exacerbate political inequality by providing more opportunities for higher income, white, and academically successful students to learn about politics."

Kahne recommends that teachers offer open classroom discussions of current events, social and political issues of interest to students. He also said classes in government, history, and social sciences, and opportunities to learn about community problems and solutions are vital to developing students' civic and political voices.

The complete report of Democracy for Some: The Civic Opportunity Gap in High School can be viewed at http://www.civicsurvey.org/.

Nestled in the foothills of Oakland, California, Mills College is a nationally renowned, independent liberal arts college offering a dynamic progressive education that fosters leadership, social responsibility, and creativity to approximately 900 undergraduate women and 500 graduate women and men. Since 2000, applications to Mills College have more than doubled. The College ranks as one of the top colleges in the West by U.S. News & World Report and one of the Best 366 Colleges by the Princeton Review. Visit us online at http://www.mills.edu/.

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