In this study, I analyzed standardized test score data from the Stanford Education Data Archive version 2.1, which also includes population data on educational contexts and outcomes for public school districts in the United States, to address the following two research questions: (1) How much do districts vary with respect to the academic outcomes of the Black students they serve? (2) What school and environmental factors are correlated with Black student academic outcomes. I studied academic outcome in three ways in this dissertation to describe in as much detail as possible the educational productivity of Black students in the United States and to combat the pitfall of heralding grade-level academic achievement as the single marker of Black student academic success. In particular, I examined average district level Black student academic achievement (grade level achievement), average district level Black student improvement rate (the rate at which scores change across student cohorts, within a grade), and average district level Black student learning rate (the rate at which scores change across grades, within a student cohort).For Black students grades 3-8 for academic years 2008/2009-2014/2015 on standardized test scores in both mathematics and English language arts, I found substantial heterogeneity in average district-level Black student academic achievement, average district-level Black student improvement rate, and average district-level Black student learning rate nationally. Across the approximately 3000 districts in the United States that service Black students and report Black student academic outcomes, 95% of these districts reported average district-level Black student academic achievement between the 2.5 and 6.0 grade levels, average district-level Black student improvement rate between −0.169 and 0.203 (average per year grade-level improvement for students in the same grade across cohorts), and average district-level Black student learning rate between 0.65 and 1.17 (average per year grade-level improvement for students in the same cohort across grades). Additional findings in this study suggested there are correlates to district-level Black student academic outcomes for Black students grades 3-5 for academic years 2008/2009-2014/2015 on standardized test scores in mathematics. Key predictors of interest included in this study were composite indices of district location (reference group: urban districts), district racial composition (reference group: proportion Black students in district), district size, district resources, Black concentrated advantage of district, and Black concentrated disadvantage of district. There were several statistically significant predictors associated with each of the 3 academic outcomes of interest. Where there is some overlap there are unique associations for each of the outcomes. Districts as educational units varied on Black student academic outcomes in important ways. These findings expand a sparse literature on the role of districts in student academic achievement (Whitehurst et al., 2013). Districts varied substantially on Black student academic outcomes. Additionally, school and environmental factors appear to be associated with these differences in various ways and magnitudes. Further research is needed to deepen the understanding of district-level variation in student academic outcomes and the potential to leverage resources and opportunities at the district level to best support students nationally.