Timely graduation in the lower vocational track

In this article, we study the impact of the so‐called non‐meritocratic factors gender, immigrant origin and social origin, and the meritocratic factors ability and achievement, on timely graduation within a specific high school type. Furthermore, the possible influence of teacher assessments of students in elementary school is investigated. Although the group of graduated students contains more girls, fewer students from immigrant origin and more students of higher social origin, multivariate analyses show that only grade point average during high school significantly affects the chances of graduating. Teachers’ assessments that distinguished between graduation chances of students did not affect graduation when controlled for the non‐meritocratic and meritocratic factors in the multivariate model.     

The intersection of culture and institutional support for Latino students’ academic success: Remediation or empowerment?

The study is framed by critical race theory to explore the intersection of cultural and institutional factors that influence Latino students’ completion of high school. The purpose of this study is to determine the extent to which factors related to students’ background, culture, socioeconomic status, and institutional-support such as participation in mentoring and/or dropout-prevention programs, can predict Latino students’ successful completion of high school. The overarching research question is: To what extent do family background, students’ educational aspirations, and institutional support programs predict whether Latino students’ complete high school? Using data from the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002 (ELS: 2002), from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) with 2,217 Hispanic participants, the study used a logistic linear regression model for the analysis. The findings identified students’ gender, socioeconomic status, first language, educational aspirations as well as the aspirations of their parents, school poverty concentration, and school support programs to be significant predictors of high school completion. The logistic regression model correctly classified between 78%, 85%, and 81% of the cases included in the group for timely completion according to first-, second-, and third-generation respectively. A similar classification was found for high school completion-within-two-years. The discussion highlights marked differences between the effect of dropout-prevention programs and that of mentoring programs on Latinos’ high school completion. In addition, that the factors represented by individual and institutional variables might not operate in isolation but instead might intersect with socioeconomic and cultural factors that ultimately create barriers for this minority group.     

Willing to play the game: How at‐risk students persist in school

A qualitative case study of 17 high‐school students identified as at risk for dropping out, this research develops a grounded theory describing the process of students' persistence and the support they received from teachers and school administrators. Three interactive factors appear critical to persistence: (a) goal orientation—students' belief they will benefit from graduating, (b) willingness to play the game—students' willingness to follow school rules, and (c) meaningful connections—relationships with teachers who believed students could graduate and provided support and caring. All three factors were present for students who stayed through the school year whereas one or more was absent from the experiences of the students who left school before graduation. The research provides further support for the role of schools in supporting students' persistence and has implications for how schools support students who are struggling to stay in school. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Psychol Schs 43: 599–611, 2006.     

Preparing Students for College and Careers: The Causal Role of Algebra II

In educational research and policy circles, college and career readiness is generating great interest. States are adopting various policy initiatives, such as rigorous curricular requirements, to increase students’ preparedness for life after high school. Implicit in many of these initiatives is the idea that college readiness and career readiness are essentially the same thing. This assumption has persisted, largely untested. Our paper explores this assumption in greater depth. Using two national datasets and an instrumental variables approach to mitigate selection bias, we evaluated the effects of completing Algebra II in high school on subsequent college and career outcomes (i.e., persistence and graduation as well as wages and career advancement). Results suggest Algebra II matters more for college outcomes than career outcomes and more for students completing Algebra II in the early 1990s than in the mid-2000s. Study limitations are discussed along with directions for future research, such as evaluating the opportunity cost associated with taking Algebra II for students seeking careers upon high school completion.     

Aztec Middle College: High School Alternatives in Community Colleges

The traditional high school model derived from the factory deficit model of the early 1900s has left many students, mainly minorities and/or low socioeconomic students, disenfranchised. This is evident in the poor school performance and high dropout rates of such students. Whereas the factory deficit model was created to promote only a few high school students to college, the rest of the students were trained for factory jobs. Today's job market requires that high school students go to college subsequent to their graduation. For this reason, middle college alternatives to traditional high schools are being adopted. Although research on middle colleges is limited due to their recent development, the results are encouraging: high school students who would otherwise have failed school or dropped out have high attendance rates and high graduation rates.     

A capability approach for online primary and secondary students with disabilities

A capability approach was used to identify and synthesise research studies about online students with disabilities in primary and secondary school (aged five to 18 years) in an attempt to describe the experience from an empirical perspective. A capability approach is intended to maximise agency and can be used to describe the extent to which individuals are able to use limited resources to build a satisfying and enjoyable life. In this analysis, a derived capability set was used to narrow the larger body of research about primary and secondary students in online education in order to consider only studies that described ways in which students successfully used online education to maximise agency. The derived capability set was: autonomy, judgement, practical reason, affiliation, high school graduation and a desire to help others. A method for deriving the capability set and ways in which a capability approach fails to describe this experience are discussed.     

Using Research to Improve College Readiness: A Research Partnership Between the Los Angeles Unified School District and the Los Angeles Education Research Institute

The Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) serves a large majority of socioeconomically disadvantaged students who are struggling academically and are underprepared for high school graduation and college. This article describes the partnership between LAUSD and the Los Angeles Education Research Institute, and how this collaboration endeavors to produce accessible and high-quality research to inform pressing problems of practice. The article also presents findings from an ongoing partnership research project analyzing a district policy focused on improving college readiness by aligning high school graduation and college-eligibility requirements. In a cohort that went through high school before the policy became mandatory for all students, less than 1/5 of all students (and 30% of graduates) met the college eligibility criteria. Our findings indicate that academic and behavioral indicators from 8th and 9th grade can help identify for possible intervention students who are not on track to meet these new graduation requirements.     

College students' perceptions of notetaking and their relationship to selected learner characteristics and course achievement

Notetaking is a universal activity in college lecture courses, but little research has been done to examine students' perceptions of this study strategy as it relates to their overall study routine. In the current study, students in a large lecture course in introductory macroeconomics were asked to complete the Notetaking Perceptions Survey (NPS), an instrument that assesses students' perceptions of the worth or value of notetaking, their perceived level of notetaking activity, and their degree of confidence about their own notetaking skill. Additionally, students' learning style, as assessed by the Learning Style Inventory (Smith and Kolb, 1986), gender, high school rank, and year of high school graduation were included as predictor variables within a multiple regression analysis to predict scores on the there notetaking perception factors. Notetaking perceptions were predicted by one of the learning style dimensions and by gender. The relationships of final course grades with the three notetaking factors from the NPS and the other learner characteristics were also determined. Grades were predicted by one of the notetaking perception factors and by high school rank.     

The Effect of Communities In Schools on High School Dropout and Graduation Rates: Results From a Multiyear,School-Level Quasi-Experimental Study

Communities In Schools, Inc. (CIS) is a nationwide initiative designed to connect needed community resources with schools to help students, particularly those identified as at-risk, successfully learn, stay in school, and prepare for life. As part of a comprehensive 5-year national evaluation of CIS, ICF International conducted a school-level quasi-experimental study on 123 CIS high schools and 123 matched comparison high schools, using public use data from 7 different states. The study examined the differences in high school dropout and graduation rates between CIS and its comparison schools over a 4-year period, starting from the year prior to CIS implementation to 3 years after implementation. Our analyses showed that CIS high schools made stronger gains in on-time graduation rates, and had greater reductions in dropout rates, than comparison schools over the same period. Results were considerably stronger for CIS schools that implemented the CIS model with a high degree of fidelity.     

The effects of performance-based school closure and restart on student performance

We study the effects of closing and restarting low-performing schools as charter schools in New Orleans and Baton Rouge. Using matched difference-in-differences identification with students in Louisiana, we estimate effects for the students who attended the treated schools at the time of treatment. We find positive and precise effects of closure/restart on elementary/middle school test scores, but no clear effects on high school graduation or college entry in New Orleans. However, in Baton Rouge high schools, the interventions reduced high school graduation by 11–15 percentage points. We also provide evidence about how and why these effects emerge. The variation in test score effects within and across cities is positively related to the increase in school value-added that treated students experienced and negatively related to student age/grade and the extent of student disruption. The effects of school closure and restart therefore depend, predictably, on policy design and implementation. This work builds on prior closure/restart research and helps explain the positive effects of the post-Katrina school reforms in New Orleans.     

Integration Factors Related to the Academic Success and Intent to Persist of College Students with Learning Disabilities

Despite increased enrollment, outcomes such as grade point average (GPA), persistence, and graduation rates for college students with learning disabilities (LD) continue to lag behind those of their nondisabled peers. Reasons for the differences vary but may include academic and social integration, factors identified as important to the success of college students in general. This research investigated the relative influence of background characteristics, precollege achievement, and college integration variables on the academic success and intent to persist of college freshmen and sophomores with LD. While academic and social integration were not unique predictors of college GPA, both integration variables were unique predictors of intent to persist. The findings suggest that beyond high school achievement and background characteristics, college experiences as captured by academic and social integration are promising constructs to help explain the persistence of college students with LD. Implications for future research and practices for high school and college personnel are discussed.     

The Effects of the Great Recession on Educational Attainment: Evidence from a Large Urban High School District

Economic crises are a recurrent phenomenon in American society, yet there is little knowledge of the impacts on educational opportunity. Using data from a large high school district as a case study, this research explores the impact of the Great Recession (2007–2009) on high school senior graduation rates in an area at the epicenter of the Recession. A logistic regression model with cluster robust standard errors is developed to estimate the recession’s impact on student subgroups’ graduation rates between the periods 2004–2013 for maximum variation. Results show that students who are historically “at-risk” experienced significant declines in graduation rates at the beginning of the recession in 2008. The decline is followed by a steep increase in graduation rates beginning in 2009, largely driven by increases for the most disadvantaged groups. These results suggest that the recession created a counter-cyclical demand for education.     

Use of Social Emotional Learning Skills to Predict Future Academic Success and Progress Toward Graduation

This study evaluated the degree to which a range of social emotional learning skills—academic self-efficacy, academic motivation, social connections, importance of school, and managing psychological and emotional distress and academic stress— could be used as an indicator of future academic outcomes. Using a sample of 4,797 from a large urban school district, we found that high school students classified as performing in the lowest 25% of their grade reported lower social emotional skills than students classified in the top 25% of academic performers by the end of the 8th grade. Two variables, perceived importance of attending college and psychological and physical stress, accounted for nearly 26% of the variance in cumulative high school GPA after controlling for 9th-grade GPA. Finally, the results indicated that a combination of 5 social emotional learning subscales effectively discriminated between students making positive progress towards high school graduation and those identified as having dropped out of or failed more than 14% of their courses.     

Have State Accountability and High-Stakes Tests Influenced Student Progression Rates in High School?

The question addressed in this paper is whether there are signs that students' progression through high school to graduation has been affected by the efforts to increase school accountability, including high-stakes exit exams. If such accountability systems were able to raise student academic performance significantly in elementary and middle school, these same students should be more likely to succeed academically in high school and graduate with their cohort. If state accountability systems also attempt to raise minimum standards for high school graduation by requiring exit tests, as many do, this could have the opposite effect of lowering high school graduation rates by putting yet one more barrier in the way of lower-performing students completing requirements.     

瑞士高中学生毕业设计探析

瑞士中学教育非常注重学生科学探究能力的培养,在高中毕业阶段,专门设置以培养学生科学探究能力为目标的毕业设计实践环节。通过对比分析其实施过程,为我国高中教育改革提供借鉴。     

高中生高等教育需求影响因素分析

本研究应用对北京、湖北、江苏、陕西四地10 909名高中生进行的大规模调查数据,探讨了中国高中生的高等教育需求及其影响因素。研究发现,有92.3%的中国学生选择高中毕业后希望继续接受高等教育,这一比例远高于中国高等教育系统的实际供给能力。通过因素分析,发现有6个因素,即“高等教育价值”、“自我感知”、“他人影响”、“家庭支持”、“个人追求”和“职业偏好”可能对学生的高等教育需求具有潜在的影响。逻辑回归分析的结果表明,这6个因素中除“他人影响”对学生的高等教育需求没有显著影响之外,其他因素对学生的高等教育需求都具有显著影响。本研究还发现,家庭收入水平对学生的高等教育需求具有一定程度的影响;不同地方高中生的高等教育需求存在显著差异;学生的性别、学习成绩对其高等教育需求具有显著影响;普通高中学生的高等教育需求也显著高于职业高中的学生。     

High School Economic Composition and College Persistence

Using a longitudinal sample of Texas high school seniors of 2002 who enrolled in college within the calendar year of high school graduation, we examine variation in college persistence according to the economic composition of their high schools, which serves as a proxy for unmeasured high school attributes that are conductive to postsecondary success. Students who graduated from affluent high schools have the highest persistence rates and those who attended poor high schools have the lowest rates. Multivariate analyses indicate that the advantages in persistence and on-time graduation from 4-year colleges enjoyed by graduates of affluent high schools cannot be fully explained by high school college orientation and academic rigor, family background, pre-college academic preparedness or the institutional characteristics. High school college orientation, family background and pre-college academic preparation largely explain why graduates from affluent high schools who first enroll in 2-year colleges have higher transfer rates to 4-year institutions; however, these factors and college characteristics do not explain the lower transfer rates for students from poor high schools. The conclusion discusses the implications of the empirical findings in light of several recent studies that call attention to the policy importance of high schools as a lever to improve persistence and completion rates via better institutional matches.     

An Efficacy Study of a Ninth-Grade Early Warning Indicator Intervention

Abstract

Building on previous research showing how well ninth-grade student behaviors predict on-time high school graduation, this experimental study investigates the impact of a ninth-grade intervention on student attendance and course passing. The study, conducted in 41 geographically and demographically diverse high schools within a single state, evaluates the effects of placing a half-time staff member in high schools to implement the Early Warning Intervention (EWI) Team model designed to monitor ninth-grade early warning indicators and provide timely interventions. Analyses based on the pre-specified student outcomes of attendance rate and percentage of ninth-grade course credits earned indicated no statistically significant impact of the intervention. On secondary outcome variables, results indicated that students in treatment schools were significantly less likely than control school students to be chronically absent. The difference between treatment and control school students on dichotomous measures of course failure were not statistically significant. The widespread dissemination of research and best practices related to early warning systems and ninth-grade interventions likely accounted for low levels of contrast between treatment and control school practices and outcomes.     

Building bridges to life after high school: Contemporary career academies and student outcomes

Career academies serve an increasingly wide range of students. This paper examines the contemporary profile of students entering career academies in a large, diverse school district and estimates causal effects of participation in one of the district's well-regarded academies on a range of high school and college outcomes. Exploiting the lottery-based admissions process of this technology-focused academy, we find that academy enrollment increases the likelihood of high school graduation by about 8 percentage points and boosts rates of college enrollment for males but not females. Analysis of intermediate outcomes suggests that effects on attendance and industry-relevant certification at least partially mediate the overall high school graduation effect.     

Labor Market Returns for Graduates of Hispanic-Serving Institutions

Latinos have become the largest minority group in American postsecondary education, a majority of whom attend two- or four-year Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs). However, little is known about labor market outcomes as result of attending these institutions. Using a unique student-level administrative database in Texas, and accounting for college selectivity, we examine whether attending an HSI influences labor market outcomes ten years after high school graduation for Latino students in Texas. We find no difference in the earnings of Hispanic graduates from HSIs and non-HSIs. This analysis represents one of the first to examine the labor market outcomes for Latino students in this sector of education accounting for critical factors that include a student’s high school and community context.