<p>Well Genetics could be a factor to a small degree but if it was the overriding factor there, it would imply that only unintelligent people live in poor places, and that simply isn’t the case. For genetics to be the biggest factor in why inner city schools do so poorly means that the kids have low IQs, their parents had low IQs, their grandparents had low IQs and so on with few outliers. These same kids, when given the opportunity, can excel.</p>
<p>For example, Harvard offers full tuition to any student whose income is below a certain line to help normalize for socioeconmic status, and those students don’t fail out at any higher rate than the rest. If they were genetically predisposed to low intelligence, they would presumably have a statistically significant higher rate of failure fo academic reasons.</p>
<p>I realize that is not. Perfect example, but it is the best I have right now while at work. It still is an example of equal performance when given an equal playing field.</p>
<p>Intelligence, if defined as one’s innate capacity to learn and reason, is almost certainly genetic and wouldn’t be affected by IQ socioeconomic status. As it stands now, though, IQ testing does not measure pure intelligence. It measures some blend of pure intelligence and educational opportunity. What the exact percentage of each is measured is certainly debatable, but I bet it’s a lot closer to 50/50, than the earlier claim about it being mainly genetic would imply.</p>