The sharpest local finding
SAT participation rose across Texas and fell in Montgomery County
Black students' SAT/ACT participation climbed statewide while Montgomery County's fell 9 points. The county diverged from a rising state.
In 2012, about 72% of Black graduates statewide had taken the SAT or ACT, and Montgomery County looked the same at 74%. By 2024, Texas had climbed to 81% and Montgomery County had slid to 65%.
This is not disengagement. The county's Black testers roughly doubled, from 212 to 454 a year; the graduating class just grew faster. The result is that about 248 Black graduates a year now finish high school there without ever sitting for a college entrance exam.
Nor is it county-wide: two campuses, Magnolia and College Park, rose past the state. The slide concentrates at a handful of schools, which is what makes it actionable: a test-taking problem at specific campuses is fixable in a way a statewide achievement gap is not.