Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Shocking Suspension Rates in thousands of districts across the nation
The Center for Civil Rights Remedies at the Civil Rights Project/Proyecto Derechos Civiles has issued “Opportunities Suspended: The Disparate Impact of Disciplinary Exclusion From School,” a nationwide report based on an analysis of Federal government suspension-related data from the 2009-10 school year for grades K-12. This first-ever breakdown of nearly 7,000 districts found that 17% of African American students nationwide received an out-of-school suspension compared to about 5% of White students. The comparable rate for Latinos was 7%. The data analyzed covered about 85% of the nation’s public school students. The suspension rates were equally striking for students with disabilities and revealed that an estimated 13% of all students with disabilities were suspended nationally, approximately twice the rate of their non-disabled peers.
The real disturbing story, however, is at the district level. This review covers school districts across the country, from every state, and it found that in nearly 200 districts, 20% or more of the total enrolled students in K-12 were suspended out of school at least once. The numbers are more shocking when broken down by race and disability. For all students with disabilities, regardless of race, over 400 districts suspended 25% or more of these students. Black students with disabilities were most at risk for out-of-school suspension with an alarming 25% national average for all districts in the sample.
The report breaks down suspension rates by state and race, and provides links to in-depth profiles of the suspension rates for every district in the sample. The alarmingly high suspension figures highlighted in the report are in stark contrast to the thousands of other districts in the report that suspended 3% or less of each subgroup. The data show that numerous school districts are not suspending large numbers of children from any racial group.
“The frequent use of out-of-school suspension results in increased dropout rates and heightened risk of youth winding up in the juvenile justice system,” stated the study’s lead author Daniel J. Losen. “We know that schools can support teachers and improve learning environments for children without forcing so many students to lose valuable days of instruction. The data also show that numerous school districts are not suspending large numbers of children from any racial group. In contrast, the incredibly high numbers of students barred from school, often for the most minor infractions, defies common sense and reveals patterns of school exclusion along the lines of race and disability status that must be rejected by all members of the public school community."
The report also reviews what research tells us about alternatives to out-of-school suspension and discusses numerous ways to respond to misbehavior that would keep children both safe and in school.
Gary Orfield, co-director of the Civil Rights Project, continued, “This important study confirms an unfortunate reality – minority students face the brunt of school-based discipline. This has to end, and the report provides thoughtful guidance to help us reach that goal.”
The report makes several recommendations to correct this disturbing trend. These recommendations are directed to:
* Parents: Bring large racial, gender, and disability disparities to the attention of local and state school boards;
* Federal and state governments: Provide greater support for research on evidence-based and promising interventions that will reduce the use of suspensions and other harsh disciplinary measures;
* Educators: Use disaggregated discipline data to guide and evaluate reform efforts; and
* Media: Question the justification and research basis behind discipline policies that keep large numbers of children out of school.
Monday, August 6, 2012
PRESCHOOL CHILDREN WHO CAN PAY ATTENTION MORE LIKELY TO FINISH COLLEGE
Young children who are able to pay attention and persist with a task have a 50 percent greater chance of completing college, according to a new study at Oregon State University.
Tracking a group of 430 preschool-age children, the study gives compelling evidence that social and behavioral skills, such as paying attention, following directions and completing a task may be even more crucial than academic abilities.
And the good news for parents and educators, the researchers said, is that attention and persistence skills are malleable and can be taught.
The results were just published online in Early Childhood Research Quarterly.
“There is a big push now to teach children early academic skills at the preschool level,” said Megan McClelland, an OSU early child development researcher and lead author of the study. “Our study shows that the biggest predictor of college completion wasn’t math or reading skills, but whether or not they were able to pay attention and finish tasks at age 4.”
Parents of preschool children were asked to rate their children on items such as “plays with a single toy for long periods of time” or “child gives up easily when difficulties are encountered.” Reading and math skills were assessed at age 7 using standardized assessments. At age 21, the same group was tested again for reading and math skills.
Surprisingly, achievement in reading and math did not significantly predict whether or not the students completed college. Instead, researchers found that children who were rated higher by their parents on attention span and persistence at age 4 had nearly 50 percent greater odds of getting a bachelor’s degree by age 25.
McClelland, who is a nationally-recognized expert in child development, said college completion has been shown in numerous studies to lead to higher wages and better job stability. She said the earlier that educators and parents can intervene, the more likely a child can succeed academically.
“We didn’t look at how well they did in college or at grade point average,” McClelland said. “The important factor was being able to focus and persist. Someone can be brilliant, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they can focus when they need to and finish a task or job.”
McClelland, who is also a core director in OSU’s Hallie E. Ford Center for Healthy Children and Families, said interventions aimed at increasing young children’s self-control abilities have repeatedly shown to help boost “self-regulation,” or a child’s ability to listen, pay attention, follow through on a task and remember instructions.
In a past study, McClelland found that simple, active classroom games such as Simon Says and Red Light/Green Light have been effective tools for increasing both literacy and self-regulation skills.
“Academic ability carries you a long way, but these other skills are also important,” McClelland said. “Increasingly, we see that the ability to listen, pay attention, and complete important tasks is crucial for success later in life.”
Friday, August 3, 2012
Students: strong hearts and lungs = better grades
Physically fit boys and girls scored higher on reading and math, research reveals
Having a healthy heart and lungs may be one of the most important factors for middle school students to make good grades in math and reading, according to findings presented at the American Psychological Association's 120th Annual Convention.
"Cardiorespiratory fitness was the only factor that we consistently found to have an impact on both boys' and girls' grades on reading and math tests," said study co-author Trent A. Petrie, PhD, professor of psychology and director of the Center for Sport Psychology at the University of North Texas. "This provides more evidence that schools need to re-examine any policies that have limited students' involvement in physical education classes."
The researchers gathered data at five Texas middle schools from 1,211 students, of whom 54 percent were female with an average age of about 12. Overall, the group was 57 percent white. Among the boys, the breakdown was 57.2 percent white, 24.2 percent Mexican-American, 9.1 percent African American, 1.1 percent Asian-American and 1.2 percent American Indian. For the girls, 58.6 percent were white, 23.4 percent were Mexican-American, 9.2 percent were African-American, 2.3 percent Asian-American and 0.6 percent were American Indian.
While previous studies have found links between being physically fit and improved academic performance, this study also examined several other potential influences, including self-esteem and social support. It also took into account the students' socioeconomic status and their self-reported academic ability, Petrie said.
In addition to cardiorespiratory fitness, social support was related to better reading scores among boys, according to the study. It defined social support as reliable help from family and friends to solve problems or deal with emotions. For girls, having a larger body mass index was the only factor other than cardiorespiratory fitness that predicted better reading scores. For boys and girls, cardiorespiratory fitness was the only factor related to their performance on the math tests. "The finding that a larger body mass index for girls was related to better performance on the reading exam may seem counterintuitive, however past studies have found being overweight was not as important for understanding boys and girls performances on tests as was their level of physical fitness," Petrie said.
From one to five months before the students were to take annual standardized reading and math tests, they answered questions about their level of physical activity, and how they viewed their academic ability, self-esteem and social support. The school district provided information on the students' socioeconomic status and reading and math scores at the end of the year.
To determine students' physical fitness, the researchers worked with physical education teachers to administer a fitness assessment program widely used in U.S. schools. The program includes a variety of tests to assess aerobic capacity, muscular strength, muscular endurance, flexibility and body composition. The assessment provides an objective measure of cardiorespiratory fitness through the Progressive Aerobic Cardiovascular Endurance Run, or PACER, and body composition through measuring BMI, the study said.
"Because this is a longitudinal study, these variables can now be considered risk factors in relation to middle school students' performance on math and reading examinations," Petrie said. "And that is essential to developing effective programs to support academic success."
Enhancing the Efficacy of Teacher Incentives through Loss Aversion
Domestic attempts to use financial incentives for teachers to increase student achievement have been ineffective. In this paper, NBER researchers demonstrate that exploiting the power of loss aversion—teachers are paid in advance and asked to give back the money if their students do not improve sufficiently—increases math test scores between 0.201 (0.076) and 0.398 (0.129) standard deviations. This is equivalent to increasing teacher quality by more than one standard deviation. A second treatment arm, identical to the loss aversion treatment but implemented in the standard fashion, yields smaller and statistically insignificant results. This suggests it is loss aversion, rather than other features of the design or population sampled, that leads to the stark differences between these findings and past research.
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Pay Teachers More: Financial Planning for Reach Models
This report contains links to financial analyses of three of the 20+ Opportunity Culture school models. Savings and cost calculations of the models—Elementary Subject Specialization, Multi-Classroom Leadership, and Time-Technology Swap Rotation—illustrate that schools could increase excellent teachers’ pay up to approximately 130%, without increasing class sizes and within existing budgets. In some variations, schools may pay all teachers more, sustainably. Combining these and other sustainable models to extend the reach of excellent teachers and promote excellence by all instructional staff may produce even greater savings to fund teacher pay increases and other priorities, while producing excellent student outcomes.
Urban Schools Often Neglect Top Teachers While Keeping Weaker Ones
A new study finds that urban schools are systematically neglecting their best teachers, losing tens of thousands every year even as they keep many of their lowest-performing teachers indefinitely—with disastrous consequences for students, schools, and the teaching profession.
The study by TNTP, a national nonprofit dedicated to ensuring that all students get excellent teachers, documents the real teacher retention crisis in America’s schools: not only a failure to retain enough teachers, but a failure to retain the right teachers.
The Irreplaceables, released at an event featuring U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, NEA Secretary-Treasurer Rebecca Pringle, and DC Public Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson, spans four urban school districts encompassing 90,000 teachers and 1.4 million students. It focuses on the experiences of the “Irreplaceables”: teachers so successful at advancing student learning that they are nearly impossible to replace. Schools rarely make a strong effort to keep these teachers despite their success—and rarely usher unsuccessful teachers out.
As a result, the best and worst teachers leave urban schools at strikingly similar rates. The nation’s 50 largest districts lose approximately 10,000 Irreplaceables each year. Meanwhile, about 40 percent of teachers with more than seven years of experience are less effective at advancing academic progress than the average first-year teacher.
“America’s best teachers are truly irreplaceable,” said Secretary Duncan. “I’ve said that when it comes to teaching, talent matters tremendously. But TNTP’s report documents in painful detail that school leaders are doing far too little to nurture, retain, and reward great teachers—and not nearly enough to identify and assist struggling teachers. Our teachers, who play such a crucial role in the lives of children, deserve a profession built on respect and rigor. And our children deserve—and need—to learn from those irreplaceable teachers.”
The study attributes negligent retention patterns to three major causes:
1. Inaction by school principals. Less than 30 percent of Irreplaceables plan to leave for reasons beyond their school’s control. Simple strategies, like public recognition for a job well done, boost their plans to stay by as many as six years. Yet two-thirds indicated that no one had encouraged them to return for another year. Similarly, principals rarely try to counsel out low performers, even though replacing them with a brand-new teacher will immediately achieve better academic results 75 percent of the time.
2. Poor school cultures and working conditions. Schools that retain more Irreplaceables have strong cultures where teachers work in an atmosphere of mutual respect, leaders respond to poor performance, and great teaching is the priority. Turnover rates among Irreplaceables were 50 percent higher in schools lacking these traits.
3. Policies that impede smarter retention practices. A number of policy barriers hamper principals from making smarter retention decisions. Because of inflexible, seniority-dominated compensation systems, for example, 55 percent of Irreplaceables earn a lower salary than the average low-performing teacher.
The report notes that current retention patterns stymie school turnaround efforts and prevent the teaching profession from earning the prestige it deserves. It offers two major recommendations:
1. Make retention of Irreplaceables a top priority. Districts should aim to keep more than 90 percent of their Irreplaceables annually, monitor and improve school working conditions, pay the best teachers what they’re worth and create new career pathways that extend their reach.
2. Strengthen the teaching profession with higher expectations. Leaders at all levels should set a new baseline standard for effectiveness: Teachers who cannot teach as well as the average first-year teacher should be considered ineffective and dismissed or counseled out (unless they are first-year teachers). Policymakers should change teacher hiring and layoff policies that discourage schools from enforcing higher expectations.
“Our schools should be obsessed with keeping their best teachers. But today it appears that they are almost completely oblivious to them,” said TNTP President Tim Daly. “It’s degrading to teachers and their profession. The challenge now is to address both sides of this crisis: the neglect of our best teachers, and the indifference to performance that keeps unsuccessful teachers in the classroom for too long.”
Public High Schools Admit Students Based on Academic Record
Schools disproportionately serve Asians and African Americans; Whites and Latinos underrepresented
A new report, “Exam Schools from the Inside,” investigates 165 public high schools in the United States that are dedicated to teaching top achievers. These high schools are sometimes known as “exam schools” in reference to their selective admissions criteria, which can include entrance exams. Researchers Chester E. Finn, Jr. and Jessica Hockett have explored these institutions, asking if their “whole school” focus on high achievers might play a larger role in educating top students in a national climate “consumed with gap closing.”
Finn and Hockett’s investigation shows that the schools are more racially diverse, taken as a whole, than is widely believed. African Americans comprise 30 percent of their enrollment versus 17 percent in the larger public high school population. Asian Americans comprise 21 percent of their enrollment, compared with 5 percent of all high-schoolers. Hispanic students are underrepresented, however, as are white students. Academically selective public high schools are 35 percent white and 13 percent Hispanic, as compared to 56 percent and 20 percent, respectively, in the public high school universe. Economically, the exam school student body is only slightly less poor than the U.S. public high school population.
Some exam schools – such as Stuyvesant, Boston Latin, Thomas Jefferson and Illinois Math and Science Academy – are well known, but the sector as a whole (enrolling 136,000 students, about 1 percent of the total high school population) is little understood. The schools spark controversy; some people think that they are elitist or exclusive while others believe that selectivity contradicts the mission of public education. The schools are vulnerable to budget cuts, even though they are vastly oversubscribed by eager applicants.
The authors surveyed the schools’ leaders and visited 11 schools, finding them to be “serious, purposeful places: competitive but supportive, energized yet calm.” Students want to be at these schools and behavior problems are minimal. Surveyed schools reported a 91% graduation rate.
Most exam schools offer AP or International Baccalaureate (IB) courses, but many also (or instead) feature other kinds of specialized offerings. Schools with a STEM focus or university affiliations, for example, offer courses that few traditional high schools provide – such as Human Infectious Diseases, Chemical Pharmacology, and Vector Calculus.
With few exceptions (chiefly in Louisiana), exam schools are not charter schools. Most teachers in exam schools are subject to the provisions of collective-bargaining contracts, but almost one_in five is not (or not fully) subject to seniority-based staffing decisions. Nearly two-thirds of survey respondents indicated that teacher-hiring decisions are made at the school level or jointly by school and district.
These “whole school” models appear to offer the kind of dedication to high achievement, as well as reinforcement from similarly focused peers, that serve students with exceptional abilities well. Whether the U.S. creates more schools of this kind or widens its offerings of specialized programs in regular district schools, the authors observe that “If the best of such schools are hothouses for incubating a disproportionate share of tomorrow’s leaders in science, technology, entrepreneurship, and other sectors that bear on society’s long-term prosperity and well-being, we’d be better off as a country if we had more of them.”
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