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Can Reorganizing K-8 Education Improve Academic Performance? The Impact of Grade Span on Student Achievement

AMY ELLEN SCHWARTZ NEW YORK UNIVERSITY LEANNA STIEFEL NEW YORK UNIVERSITY ROSS RUBENSTEIN SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY JEFFREY ZABEL TUFTS UNIVERSITY. Can Reorganizing K-8 Education Improve Academic Performance? The Impact of Grade Span on Student Achievement.

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Can Reorganizing K-8 Education Improve Academic Performance? The Impact of Grade Span on Student Achievement

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  1. AMY ELLEN SCHWARTZ NEW YORK UNIVERSITY LEANNA STIEFEL NEW YORK UNIVERSITY ROSS RUBENSTEIN SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY JEFFREY ZABEL TUFTS UNIVERSITY Can Reorganizing K-8 Education Improve Academic Performance? The Impact of Grade Span on Student Achievement US Department of Education Institute for Education Sciences grant R305E040096 provided support for work leading to this paper.

  2. Overview • Motivation and lit review • Why might grade span matter? • Data and description of NYC grade spans • Analysis and Results • Conclusions

  3. Motivation for Study Why might grade span matter? Indirect effects through relationships with: • Timing and number of school transitions • Student-school matching • School culture

  4. Conceptual Model: Grade Span and Student Performance

  5. Previous Literature • Much attention to, and controversy over, middle schools (6-8) • Four previous good quality studies • Middle schools lower on-time high school graduation • K-8s in Philadelphia outperform middle schools • Higher self-esteem and perceived safety in K-8 vs. middle schools • 6th graders in elementary school have fewer behavioral problems relative to those in middle school

  6. Considerable experimentation but little evidence Five-fold increase in percentage of middle schools (6-8) between 1971 and 2002 Recent trend toward K-8 schools Considerable experimentation with grade span as policy reform, but little rigorous evidence on effects for different types of students

  7. Contributions of Current Study • Exploits grade span variation in nation’s largest district (New York City) • Uses longitudinal student data to track cohorts over five years • Examines transitions across grades and across schools, rather a single point in time • Measure gains in academic performance between third grade and the eighth grade • Eighth grade critical juncture for high school readiness

  8. Data • Elementary and middle grades in NYC • 915 schools • Approximately 28 grade span configurations • Include students making “Standard Academic Progress” (SAP) from 4th to 8th grade • Track students’ “academic paths” Sequence of grade span configurations a student might attend between 4th and 8th grades (e.g. K-5 to 6-8)

  9. Trends in Grade Span • More K-5 and 6-8 • Fewer K-6 and 7-8 • More K-8

  10. Many Paths From 4th to 8th Grade

  11. Analyses • Basic models: Regress eighth grade scores (math and reading) on academic paths, controlling for third grade scores and a variety of student characteristics • Sensitivity analyses • Attrition • Non-SAP students • Interactions with race and performance

  12. Yes! For example K-8 compared to 6-8:-- start with lower performance in 3rd grade-- end with higher performance in 8th grade-- have lower percentage of white and Asian-- have higher percentage of black-- have poorer studentsImportant to control for these differences Do Grade Spans Look Different?

  13. Academic Paths: 8th graders in 2001-2002, SAP Cohort

  14. Threats to Validity and Unanswered Questions Attrition bias from exclusion of exiting and retained students Approach: Correction for non-random attrition in panel data Are effects different for non-SAP students who enter later? Approach: Model of short-term gains for retained and exiting students Are effects different by sub-groups? Approach: Interactions between grade span and student characteristics (race, low performance)

  15. What happens when correct for attrition out of SAP? Still find comparatively better performance in math and reading for students in: K-8 whole time Switch into K-8 A few others (K-6/5-8)

  16. Students who enter late or are retained Do they do as well in K-8’s as SAP students who have been there since 3rd grade? Yes and sometimes better from 7th to 8th grade for students in SAP and latecomers SAP always do better in K-8 New entrants and retainees do better even or the same

  17. Subgroup Analysis: 8th Graders in 2001-02 Do lower achieving students do better in some paths? (Compared to K-5/6-8) Yes, but only in math. They do better in K-8 In reading, they do worse in K-8 and most other paths. Do black, Hispanic or Asian Students do better in some paths? No particular paths stand out

  18. Conclusions Grade span appears to matter • Significantly larger long-term gains for students in K-8 • Effects hold in various specifications and for students not making standard academic progress • Little evidence of differential effects for minority and low-performing students

  19. Cautions and unanswered questions What features of K-8 are particularly effective? Would scaling up to all K-8 have same effects? Experimental designs could improve validity of results

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