MSPAP mathematics performance of Maryland schools as a function of urbanicity, ethnicity and gender

This research was used to determine if the interaction of urbanicity moderates the main effects of ethnicity on the MSPAP mathematics scores of students attending public school in Maryland.; This study is longitudinal, in that a cohort from the population of students in third grade in 1995, were studied again, in 1997, in the fifth grade; and again, in 2000, when a cohort of the students were in the eighth grade.; A review of the literature has determined that there is a dearth of studies that have considered the effect of the factor of urbanicity in conjunction with the effect of ethnicity and gender on mathematics performance; therefore, the following interaction hypotheses were tested. Alpha was set at 0.05: (1) For the year, 1995, the interaction of urbanicity with ethnicity moderates the main effect of ethnicity on the MSPAP mathematics scores of third grade students. (2) For the year, 1997, the interaction of urbanicity with ethnicity moderates the main effect of ethnicity on the MSPAP mathematics scores of fifth grade students. (3) For the year, 2000, the interaction of urbanicity with ethnicity moderates the main effect of ethnicity on the MSPAP mathematics scores of eighth grade students.; Using urbanicity as a basis for selection, a systematic random sample was selected for each study year. Each level of urbanicity was then partitioned on the basis of ethnicity, and then cross-partitioned on the basis of gender. The data were analyzed using the factorial analysis of variance (ANOVA).; The data analysis did not support hypothesis one, or three, because in 1995 and 2000, the interaction between urbanicity with ethnicity is not significant. Moreover, none of the two-way or three-way interactions are significant. Only hypothesis two was accepted, because, in 1997, there is a significant interaction of urbanicity with ethnicity.; In summary, in all study years the two-way and three-way interactions with gender are not significant; suburban scores were the highest; the mean for Asian-Americans was higher than the mean for White-Americans and African-Americans; and the mean for African-Americans was lower than for White-Americans and Asian-Americans.