Closing Achievement Gaps: Research-Based Lessons for Educators

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Closing Achievement Gaps Research-Based Lessons
for Educators

• Joseph Murphy
• Vanderbilt University

joseph.f.murphy_at_vanderbilt.edu [phone]
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• Part A.
• Portrayals of Gaps

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(46) (42) (34) (25) (27)
(29) (29) (29) (32) (26) Year
(Gap)
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(33) (40) (41)
(40) (35) (34)
(31) Year (Gap)
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(36) (31) (27) (18)
(20) (28) (31) (32) (29)
(22) Year (Gap)
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(29) (30) (26)
(27) (26) (28)
(26) Year (Gap)
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(40) (38) (32) (29) (21)
(26) (26) (27) (32) (28) Year (Gap)
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(32) (29)
(31) (33) Year (Gap)
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(52) (50) (31) (21)
(30) (36) (30) (29) (31)
(29) Year (Gap)
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(23) (29)
(26) (25) (25) Year
(Gap)
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(.85) (.96) (.97) (.99) (1.06)
(1.07) (1.11) (1.10) (1.08) (1.11)
(1.14) Year (Gap)
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(.76) (.78) (.80) (.86) (.85)
(.82) (.89) (.74) (.97) (.75)
(1.03) Year (Gap)
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(.79) (.87) (.84) (.96) (.91) (.91) (.84)
(.89) (.93) (.89) (.96) Year (Gap)
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(.90) (.87) (1.42) (.98) (.90) (.97)
(.92) (.94) (1.02) (1.02) (.78) Year (Gap)
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(103) (103)
(105) (105)
(111) Year (Gap)
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(96) (92)
(96) (99)
(98) Year (Gap)
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(4.3) (4.4)
(4.6) (4.7)
(5.2) Year (Gap)
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(23.0) (17.2) (14.1) (12.5) (9.8) (6.1) (7.0)
(9.8) (5.8) (5.4) (6.3) (4.5) Year (Gap)
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(9.0) (11.5) (8.3) (7.0) (4.5) (3.7)
(4.2) (5.9) (5.7) (5.3) (4.8)
(4.4) Year (Gap)
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(12.2) (15.3) (13.8) (13.4) (11.6) (13.4)
(13.7) (16.2) (13.4) (16.5) (15.2) (17.4) Year
(Gap)
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Why is it important?

• Individual
• Society

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Individual Educational Attainment

• Increased chance of falling behind in school
• Higher dropout rate
• Reduced enrollment in college
• Less likelihood of college degree

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• Over a third of the low SES group and just 3
  percent of the high group are permanent
  dropouts, meaning high school dropouts who at
  approximately age 22 still lack high school
  certification of any type. Whereas almost 60
  percent of the high SES group attended a
  four-year college by age 22, just 7 percent low
  SES youth did. (Alexander, et al., 2007)
• Horribly, NAEP data indicate that, on average,
  Black students are leaving high school with less
  mathematical knowledge than white 8th graders
  possess. (Hughes, 2003)

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Individual Employment Opportunity

• Limited career path
• Concentration in low-paying positions

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Individual Wages

• Lower wages

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• The gap has shifted from being an indicator of
  educational inequality to a direct cause of
  socioeconomic inequality.

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Society Economic

• Reduced economic competitiveness
• Lower standard of living
• Impediment to productivity and performance
• Contribution to decline in economic health

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• If the minority-white gap had been closed between
  1983 and 1998
• GDP would have been 310 - 525 billion higher (2
  - 4 of GDP) in 2008 dollars
• If the SES gap had been closed between 1983 and
  1998
• GDP would have been 400 - 600 billion higher (3
  - 5 of GDP) in 2008 dollars

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Society Social Well-Being

• Reinforces social inequality and exacerbates
  social justice problems
• Reduces ties that bind society
• Damages political fabric of democracy

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• Part B.
• Insights and Rules for Closing Achievement Gaps
• General Rules of Engagement

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Four Sets of Findings

• Big Picture Conclusions
• Factors to Emphasize
• Timing
• Cautions

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• Big Picture Conclusions

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• By and large,
• schools do not cause achievement gaps.

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50 75
100 25
25
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4 3 2 1
3 2 1
Summer 4 5
Summer 3 4
Summer 2 3
Summer 1 2
Summer K 1
2 1
K 1 2 3
4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12

(Preschool) Period A (Age 0-5)
(K 5) Period B ( Age 6 11)
(6 12) Period C (Age 12 18)
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K
3 4 50 of gap
25 of gap

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Summer effect
school

K
3 4 50 of gap
25 of gap

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Schools cannot close achievement gaps alone.
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Much of the solution is to be found in factors
external to the school, but
social policy
schooling
schools have a part to play.
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• Schools have not been
• especially effective in
• helping close
• achievement gaps.

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Deep-Seated, Long-Standing, Hard-to-Solve Problem

• Historically not a front-burner issue
• An unwillingness to see the issue in ethical
  terms
• A reluctance to re-set priorities and re-allocate
  resources

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• Since low-income and minority
• students are more school-
• dependent than their more
• advantaged peers, there is
• potential for schools to help
• solve the problem.

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What School Dependency Means

• These youngsters are more advantaged in general
  when schools do things well
• These youngsters are more disadvantaged in
  general when schools do not do things well

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• Factors

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• A focus on both
• out-of-school and
• in-school factors
• is required.

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• Schools did not
• cause the gaps.
• They cannot solve gap
• problems alone.

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• A combination of factors
• is required to close
• achievement gaps.

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Silver Bullet
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Better instruction
Stronger culture (academic press)
Lower class size
More personalization
Greater curricular rigor
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• Students do not need
• different types of interventions.
• They require
• more intensive support.

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Academic and Environmental Factors Need to be
Addressed in Tandem

• Instructional program
• Culture

Ultimately, programs that rely entirely on
increasing academic standards without parallel
attention to social-emotional factors associated
with achievement motivation and performance will
be less likely to improve student achievement
outcomes. (Becker and Luther, 2002)
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• We need to concentrate on those
• factors that disproportionately
• advantage low-income and
• minority students.

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(No Transcript)
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• Preschool programs
• Cooperative instructional strategies
• Smaller class sizes
• Quality instruction
• Co-curricular/extra curricular activities
• More rigorous courses
• Placement in high SES schools (school
  composition)
• Minority teachers/working class teachers
• Parent help with homework
• Protective, supportive, risk-free environment
• Service learning
• High teacher expectations

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Smaller Class Size

• Ferguson, 1998
• Finn, 1998
• Finn Achilles, 1990
• Grissmar, 1998

• Kruger Whitmore
• Rothstein, 2004
• Slavin Madden, 2006

• More beneficial for minority than non-minority
  students
• Largest for disadvantaged students
• Greater for students attending inner-city schools

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Quality Instruction

• The impact of the teacher is far greater for
  minority studentsGood teachers can have a
  differentially positive effect on minority
  students. (Singham, 2003)

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Curricular Rigor

• Minority and low-income students see to benefit
  more than others from stronger course
  requirements. (Thompson, 2002)
• Content standards have a positive effect on
  average achievement the gains are especially
  large more minority students. (Harris Hertert,
  2006)
• The gains from taking a more demanding
  mathematics curriculum are even greater for
  African American and Latino students than for
  white students. (Thompson OQuinn, 2001)

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Service Learning

• Service learning may be especially attractive to
  principals of low SES schools, in part because it
  may be related to higher achievement generally
  and to smaller achievement gaps between higher
  and lower income students. (Scales, et al.,
  2006)
• Community service appears to be related to a
  smaller achievement gap between students from
  lower and higher income backgrounds. Moreover,
  experiencing service-learning for at least a few
  weeks appears to be related to a smaller gap in
  most academic outcomes between low and high-SES
  students. (Scales, et al., 2006)

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• Some factors carry more
• weight than others.

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All factors are not equal in closing the
gap.Some have more power to reduce discrepancies.

• Opportunity to learn
• Quality instruction

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An integrated, coherent, cohesive, overlapping
design works best.
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service learning
after school tutoring program
ninth grade academy
summer support, grades 8 and 9
co-curricular involvement
master teachers
acceleration remediation design
extra servicesdouble sessions
faculty advisors
extended schooling
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• Issues

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• There is no short-term solution.

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Early interventions trump later interventions.
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• The place to solve the
• 9th grade problem
• is in preschool.

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ball
ball
hill
hill
8th grade
vs.
12th grade
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Later

• Problems are harder
• Problems are more entrenched
• Problems are less malleable
• Problems have infected multiple domains
• (e.g., reading problem ? motivation ?
  engagement) an early problem of 1 or 2
  things becomes a later problem of 5 or 6
  things

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Some factors carry more weight in certain
periods of the school career.

• High teacher expectations are more powerful in
  PreK-4
• High personalization is more powerful in grades
  8-12

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Length of time intreatment is important.
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Quality Instruction (concept portrait)
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Prevention trumps remediation.
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Acceleration remediation trumps remediation.
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• lesson 1 lesson 2
• instruction ? learning instruction
• problem
• arises
• lesson 1 lesson 2
• instruction ? learning instruction
• problem
• arises

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• One rarely arrives --
• do not withdraw supports.

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• Cautions

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Use of Categories

• Lumping minorities together
• Aggregating diverse groups within categories
• Ignoring individual differences

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• Lumping groups into minority status is
  problematic.

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• Sub-Group Scores
• Mask Differences
• Many groups in Hispanic and Asian designations

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We need to remember that we are talking about
averages.
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(No Transcript)
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Factors are not uniformly effective for all
forms of the gap.
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• There is a need to surface potential unintended
  consequences.

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• move enhance accountability via testing
• strategy move most effective teachers to
  tested grades
• consequences ???
• move enhance academic rigor
• strategy detrack
• consequence ???
• move create culturally responsive culture
• strategy establish AA center/club
• consequence ???

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Costs as well as benefits of gap reduction
strategies need to be weighed.

• Ninth grade academy? Salary supplement for
  teachers working in schools with high
  concentrations of low-income students? Additional
  AP courses?

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Do not lose sight of the real goal (forest)
when focusing on the gaps (trees).
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• The core issue is
• addressing underachievement.

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Three Dimensions of Achievement

• Level
• Equity
• Value added

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gap .6
1.2
1.4 VALUE ADDED
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gap .2
.4
.3 LEVEL
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• Absolute vs. Relative Gain

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Absolute 3.0 3.5 .5 Relative Rate
of change black 60 white
44 Black achievement as of white
achievement 63 70
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Do not count on luck, prayer, magic, or martyrs
to solve the problem.
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ACTIONS ACTIONS ACTIONS ACTIONS ACTIONS
Focus Enhancement Actions Enhancement Actions Barrier-Removal Actions Barrier-Removal Actions
Focus Help All Equally Help Low-SES More Help All Equally Help Low-SES More
All Students 1 Align curriculum Deepen PD for Teachers 2 Provide academic summer school Use cooperative learning strategies Raise teacher expectations Add time to school day 3 4 Detrack Re-culture discriminatory discipline culture Remove transportation barriers for more co-curricular opportunities Reduce class size
Targeted Students 5 6 Provide supplemental tutoring Target additional instructional time Form cultural similar clubs (AA) 7 8 Remove barriers that prevent parents from participating with school
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• Part C.
• Causes of Achievement Gaps

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I. Introduction

• A. Starting point
• B. Frames of investigation
• 1. Categorical
• 2. Theoretical
• 3. Core frame
• a) family/society (non-school)
• b) school

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• 4. Our frame
• a) SES
• b) family
• c) community
• d) individual factors
• e) peers
• f) racial discrimination
• g) ???
• h) schooling

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Out-of-School Educational Experiences
Community Context
Social and Economic Context
Achievement Gap
Peer Context
Racial Context
Individual Context
K-12 Educational Context
Family Context
Figure 3.1 Causes of the Achievement Gap