PISA by state by race: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Florida

The PISA test was given to large samples sizes in three American states. From the federal National Center for Educational Statistics:

PISA 2012
	Race / Ethnicity	Mean	Math	Science	Reading
Massachusetts
	White	538	530	545	540
	Black	467	458	466	476
	Hispanic	460	446	460	475
	Asian	578	569	580	584
	Multiracial	NA	NA	NA	NA
Connecticut
	White	542	534	547	546
	Black	434	421	433	447
	Hispanic	456	442	463	463
	Asian	548	534	553	558
	Multiracial	512	496	520	521
Florida
	White	512	499	520	518
	Black	429	413	425	449
	Hispanic	474	458	475	489
	Asian	NA	NA	NA	NA
	Multiracial	486	467	500	492
White-Black Gaps
	Massachusetts	72	72	79	64
	Connecticut	109	113	114	99
	Florida	83	86	95	69
White-Hispanic Gaps
	Massachusetts	78	84	85	65
	Connecticut	86	92	84	83
	Florida	38	41	45	29

The standard deviation is supposed to be 100, so you can just put a decimal place in front of those gap numbers to convert them into rough z scores.

We can see patterns here that shouldn't be unexpected. Massachusetts, home to the education-industrial complex since 1636, has smart whites. Connecticut, home to the hedge fund industry, has smart whites.

Florida, not so much. Still, this would be a good time for an old anecdote about how Florida isn't wall-to-wall Parrot Heads. I had a girlfriend in college who went to the public high school in Cocoa Beach, FL (the town that was the setting for the 1960s sit-com I Dream of Jeannie). She told me she scored 1580 on the SAT (M+V, old-style). I exclaimed:

"You must have had the highest score in your high school!"

"Oh, no, I was fourth-highest."

"Fourth? Who were the other three? The children of rocket scientists?" (In my defense, this was a relatively new witticism in 1979.)

"Yes."

Massachusetts has pretty smart blacks, going back to Phillis Wheatley and W.E. Du Bois. Connecticut and Florida, not so much.

Florida has pretty smart Hispanics, although the wealthy Cubans and other rich Latin Americans are getting diluted more and more.