College completion gaps between blacks and whites: what accounts for regional differences?

The educational achievement gap between blacks and whites in the US is wide and widening at the college graduate level. This paper explores reasons for the differential college completion gaps by race across regions. Two hypotheses are explored. The first hypothesis is that in some regions black children have lagged far behind their white peers in factors determining access to a college education, while in other regions these differences have not been as pronounced. The other hypothesis is that regional college completion gaps reflect ongoing differences among the regions in location preferences on the part of black and white adults. The study concludes that variation across regions in the magnitude of college completion gaps between blacks and whites is a product both of differences in past factors affecting access to college and of ongoing differences in location preferences of black and white adults.