Research Archive

When you read a newspaper or magazine article about the latest education research, there is a good chance you’ll find a quote from a critic pooh-poohing the findings.

That’s part of the journalistic tradition of telling both sides of a story. But it also has the unintended effect of raising doubts about the credibility of education research in general: If every study published comes under criticism -- or is contradicted by other research -- what can you believe?

That question is particularly relevant today when special interest groups seek to sway public opinion by publishing their own reports and studies designed to sell a political perspective -- and seek to discredit research that contradicts their ideological beliefs.

But fear not. My November cover story, “Politics and Research,” takes a look at the deluge of reports and studies being published today -- and at whether that research is credible or simply a political tool designed to sway policymakers.

All in all, the news is good. Education research is improving in quality and relevance to education policymakers. And finding this quality research isn’t all that hard if, as Arthur Levine, former president of Columbia University’s Teachers College, advises, you become “a better consumer of what’s out there.”

If you read the story online (www.asbj.com/MainMenuCategory/Archive/2007/November/PoliticsandResearch.aspx), you’ll also find tips on how to become that better consumer, as well as an article on how the media reports on research—and how the profession of journalism is trying to do a better job in telling you what you need to know.

Del Stover, Senior Editor

Call me a nerd if you want to, but I really like this book. It’s called The New Meaning of Educational Change, and it’s not exactly beach reading.

I’ll admit I was skeptical -- both (generally) of my upcoming assignment to write about change, and (specifically) of this 338-page tome by Michael Fullan, an emeritus professor at the University of Toronto, which I found using the time-honored research method of typing “educational change” in Google and seeing what came up.

It turns out this is the fourth (!) edition of this same book, hence “new” in the title. It seems the professor has been writing about this subject for some 25 years. Is there really that much to say about change? I thought. Can’t you -- in the immortal words of the philosopher Nike -- “Just do it?”

I was wrong. Far from being irrelevant and “academic” -- in the worst sense of the word -- the book goes to the heart of why schools and school districts have such a hard time with what Fullan calls “innovativeness.”

“We vastly underestimate both what change is … and what factors and processes account for it ...,” Fullan writes early on, and then proceeds to explain why.

All real change, whether voluntary (your new curriculum, perhaps) or involuntary (NCLB), involves what one researcher calls “loss, anxiety, and struggle.” And, thus, ambivalence. The only way change can take hold, Fullan says, is if there is “shared meaning” among all parties involved. In other words, those at all levels, from conception through implementation, must know what problem the proposed change is expected to address, how it plans to do this, how progress will be measured, etc.

Examples abound. For instance, I thought of shared meaning -- or, more precisely, the apparent lack of it -- in relation to NCLB and its provisions for Adequate Yearly Progress. It’s a good bet that the people who thought up AYP did not plan on urban schools trying to achieve it by narrowing their curriculum, cutting out arts and science, and drilling their students relentlessly. But that is what some educators have done. Why? I suspect it’s because they have perceived this change as threatening on a number of levels. The “meaning” for them is much different than it is for the politicians and policymakers.

As Fullan puts it, “meaning” must be fostered in relation to both the “what” and the “how” of change.

“It is possible to be crystal clear about what one wants and totally inept at achieving it,” Fullan writes. “Or to be skilled at managing change but empty-headed about which changes are most needed. To make matters more difficult, we often do not know what we want, or do not know the actual consequences of a direction until we get there.”

Beach reading? Hardly. But a good primer on the kind of groundwork it will take to change America’s schools.

Lawrence Hardy, Senior Editor

I always find fascinating what Census Bureau surveys reveal. In the latest analysis of data collected in 2004, it seems parents are taking ever more active roles in their child’s education and upbringing, in general. That’s good news since studies have proven that parent involvement is incredibly important to student success.

For instance, the number of children under the age of 12 who had restrictions on the content and quantity of television they viewed increased by more than 10 percent from more than a decade ago. Even teenagers had to live with more restrictions on their television viewing, which went up by 7 percent from 1994 to 47 percent.

Meanwhile, more than half of respondents reported reading an average of six or more times a week to 3- to 5-year-olds and seven or more times per week to children who were between 1 and 2 years old.

And more kids are participating in extracurricular activities like music, dance, computer, and language lessons than a decade ago; rising from 24 to 33 percent for 6- to 11-year-olds -- though the figures are higher for wealthier and Asian families.

To check out the data, go to the Census Bureau at www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/2004_detailedtables.html .

Naomi Dillon, Senior Editor

Earlier this week, Swiss researchers released the findings of a survey they disseminated to more than 5,000 Switzerland youth. In essence, the study (conducted in 2002) determined among those 16- to 20-year-olds who smoked marijuana only, marijuana and cigarettes, or abstained from both, the group who solely smoked marijuana were “more socially driven … significantly more likely to practice sports and they have a better relationship with their peers,” than those who smoked neither.

The study, published in this month’s issue of the Archives of Pediatrics & Medicine, appears to contradict the widely-held belief that marijuana is a gateway drug and its use can lead to experimentation in other drugs … which leads me to my point and our current ASBJ cover story, “Politics and Research.”

Just about any topic can be spun, stretched, dissected, or altered in some way to achieve different results, as Senior Editor Del Stover discovered in reporting on the field of education research. That’s not to say there isn’t merit or value in many of these reports, even the bad ones.

Nor am I saying the Swiss researchers who conducted the marijuana-use survey were purposefully trying to skew the findings, or that what they found isn’t true. It just may only be true for that small group. In Switzerland, marijuana-use has risen among that age group, in contrast to the decline it has made among American teens.

Research can only tell us so much, and it’s up to you as savvy consumers of the literature to determine what to take from it and what to leave behind.

Naomi Dillon, Senior Editor

The National Board for Professional Teaching Standards has just announced its largest class ever—8,491 teachers attained certification this year, bringing the total number of NBPTS-certified teachers to more than 63,000.

These teachers should be commended for their work, having passed grueling tests to demonstrate teaching competency through videos and analysis of their instructional methods as well as subject-matter competency. Only about 40 percent of NBPTS candidates pass on the first try, and NBPTS thinks that only about 70 percent pass within the three-year time frame. Most teachers—even those who fail—say it was the best professional development they’ve ever had.

But the story behind this story is that most school districts and school boards do not know how to best use these teachers’ skills. While NBPTS has not kept in touch with its alumni, anecdotal evidence proves that most of the teachers go back to same jobs they had before, with little or no recognition of their accomplishment.

This is a shame. There are so many ways these master teachers, who obviously wanted a challenge, could be put to better use: as lead teachers, mentors, curriculum specialists, or assistant administrators. But school boards and administrators have tended to be oblivious. Researcher Julia Koppich recently told me that in her research school boards “barely registered on the radar screen” and many administrators were overwhelmed or unwilling to find ways to better use these teachers. She found that, surprisingly, the teachers unions were the most important factor in prodding districts to recognize, use, and reward these teachers.

So for any district looking for ideas for policies or practices, I’ve planted a few in the upcoming edition of School Board News (www.nsba.org/site/page_sbn_issue.asp?TRACKID=&CID=682&DID=9461).

Joetta Sack-Min, Associate Editor

Why does it seem that research these days reveals one disturbing trend after another? On Tuesday, a new national survey was released that shows while drug abuse among teens has declined in many areas, no progress has been made against the abuse of prescription painkillers.

Conducted by the University of Michigan’s Institute of Social Research and funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the 33rd annual Monitoring the Future survey found that abuse of painkillers like OxyContin and Vicodin is second only to marijuana, which is the most widely used narcotic.

Researchers first began asking teens about OxyContin in 2002, and since that time the reported use has been erratic. In 2007, the figures were actually higher than they were five years ago. At least one in 20 high school seniors reported trying the drug in the past year. Meanwhile, one in 10 high school seniors acknowledged using Vicodin, whose abuse has continued to stay at recent peak levels.

Even scarier, the use of MDMA or ecstasy among teens has risen once again, marking a trend of gradual increases in the last several years that suggest adolescents have become comfortable with the narcotic and don’t deem it a risk.

Researchers polled nearly 50,000 students from 403 secondary schools. To view the complete report, go to www.ns.umich.edu/htdocs/releases/story.php?id=6225.

Naomi Dillon, Senior Editor

Does suspending misbehaving students—or sending them to alternative schools —set them on the path to prison?

That question is at the heart of a new report, Texas’ School-to-Prison Pipeline: Dropout to Incarceration, The Impact of School Discipline and Zero Tolerance, published by Texas Appleseed, a nonprofit public interest law center.

The title is overdramatic. But the conclusions are worthy of reflection: “The precursor for many young people’s involvement in the juvenile justice system [or prison] is disciplinary referrals in schools.”

That’s not to suggest that school officials allow students to run amok in the classroom. Nor does anyone suggest school suspensions are responsible for students turning down the path of crime and incarceration later in life.

What the report does suggest is that local schools must be thoughtful in their approach to discipline. Taking a hard line with students—with zero tolerance and harsh penalties—actually is counterproductive, undermining school climate and, instead of discouraging misbehavior, actually can encourage more misbehavior among rebellious youth.

Fact is, some school officials are too eager to crack the whip. Something is wrong when some schools are six times as likely as neighboring schools to suspend students or send them to an alternative education program.

Although the report lists numerous strategies for improving your school district’s disciplinary practices, its real value to local school policymakers is more basic: It reminds you that schools exist to help students.

And that help is needed right now. If all your schools do is punish misbehaving students —harshly and with no consideration to the reasons behind such misbehavior—then your schools aren’t really solving the underlying problem. And if a student ends up in an escalating cycle of misbehavior and punishment, then there is an increasing likelihood that imprisonment lies in that young person’s future.

The report can be found at www.texasappleseed.net.

Del Stover, Senior Editor

One in 10 students may be suffering from a condition known as “impaired working memory”—and that’s having a negative impact on their academic performance.

So report researchers in a news release from Durham University in the United Kingdom. They also say this impairment is rarely identified by teachers, who are more likely to view affected children “as inattentive or as having lower levels of intelligence.”

So what is working memory? According to MedicineNet.com, working memory—or short-term memory—is “a system for temporarily storing information and managing the information required to carry out complex cognitive tasks.”

Translation: If you are told two numbers, you remember them, and you multiply those numbers in your head, you’re using your working memory.

It’s pretty obvious that a student’s classroom success depends somewhat on his or her ability to follow a teacher’s instructions, do some quick mental calculations, or remember what’s been said in a classroom lecture long enough to write it down.

“Working memory is a bit like a mental jotting pad, and how good this is in someone will either ease their path to learning or seriously prevent them from learning,” Dr. Tracy Alloway, head of the research team, is quoted as saying.

So how practical is this information for you? Well, some of your teachers will be familiar with the basic concept of working memory and instruction, and some special education teachers will have learned something about this condition.

But it can’t hurt to point out that the condition may be more common than they think—and isn’t the same thing as attention deficit disorder (ADD), although the challenges for students can appear similar. Also, it turns out that there are checklists available that your teachers can use to identify children who may have this problem, and there are diagnostic tools available to confirm such suspicions.

And, finally, there are instructional techniques to help students cope with this impairment.

All anyone needs to do is a little more research.

It might prove worthwhile. As Alloway notes, “early identification of these children will be a major step toward addressing underachievement. It will mean teachers can adapt their methods to help the children’s learning before they fall too far behind their peers.”

Del Stover, Senior Editor

For two years in a row, low-income students in Minneapolis have performed better academically when enrolled in the city school system, as opposed to city kids who opted to be bused to suburban school systems under the state’s voluntary desegregation program.

That was one of the findings of Minnesota Voluntary Public School Choice
2006–2007: Evaluation Report, published recently by the Minnesota Department of Education.

The findings don’t suggest the Minneapolis schools are “better” than their suburban counterparts. Any quick glance at area test scores shows that suburban schools still perform better overall.

But that’s the point, in my mind: It’s relatively easy to teach students from middle-class homes. It’s not so easy to teach students from poor, inner-city homes.

Apparently schools in the Minneapolis suburbs are coming face-to-face with that reality.
I hope policymakers at all levels of government take note of these findings. Proponents of vouchers also should take heed.

It’s vital to remember is that this nation has huge numbers of poorer children who are tough to teach. And no school system anywhere—urban, suburban, or rural—has found the magical formula to change that reality.

So when people complain about poor-performing schools—or, in particular, how bad urban schools are—they need to rethink their conclusions. Just because a school reports poor achievement levels doesn’t mean the school overall isn’t doing its job. It might just mean that their kids started off behind academically—and just can’t catch up.

Everyone knows this—but somehow it gets lost in the debate. In Minnesota, state officials told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that “the difference may be because the suburban choice students tested each year are not the same students,” so the comparison of test scores is faulty.

Well, guess what? Have you looked at student mobility rates in urban areas these days? Policymakers have been holding city schools accountable under NCLB without regard to whether the students tested for adequate yearly progress (AYP) goals are the same ones that the schools actually taught.

Of course, let’s be fair. State officials might be correct. Perhaps the data is skewed by factors that still need to be identified.

But I agree with what Minneapolis school officials are saying in the meantime. They’re urging parents to take a closer look at what the city schools have to offer. They may have bused their children to the suburbs for the wrong reasons.

Del Stover, Senior Editor

French toast, pancakes, and Eggs Benedict. I’ve always loved breakfast, but until just a few years ago I enjoyed these morning staples well after sunup and sometimes not at all. In fact, as a teenager my eating habits were atrocious. I not only skipped breakfast but often lunch, as well.

Bad mistake and one quantified by a new study published in this month’s journal of Pediatrics. Over five years, researchers followed the diet and weight patterns of 2,216 teens from Minneapolis-St. Paul public schools.

They discovered that the kids who ate breakfast on a regular basis had a lower body mass index and gained less weight than those who skipped the meal. The early morning noshers also tended to be more physically active than their counterparts.

Coincidence? Correlation? It’s too early say, but the scant research thus far seems to corroborate the old anecdote that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. With childhood obesity rates almost tripling over the last 20 years, any movement toward a healthier lifestyle among today’s youth is critical.

I certainly made my move several years back, and with fair consistency consume breakfast almost on a daily basis. Though, these days my breakfast choices have grown, as well, to healthier alternatives like oatmeal, muesli, and scrambled egg whites.

Check out the School Nutrition Association’s campaign for school breakfast, which officially ends today, for more good reasons on why you should promote eating breakfast at your school.

Naomi Dillon, Senior Editor

Careless errors can be costly ones.

“Ho-hum,” you might be saying. “Why is he stating the obvious?”

Unfortunately, because it’s true. And it’s a lesson I learned again recently after writing my April feature, “Time to Heal," which tells the tragic story of the London School explosion that killed more than 300 children.

The explosion should not have happened, but it did largely because school officials carelessly decided to cut corners. They saved a few pennies at a huge cost of life.

Growing up in Texas, I was vaguely aware of the 1937 explosion. What I didn’t realize until after the story was written was that my grandfather was one of the rescue workers at the scene. A.T. Vestal was working for the Premier Oil Company in Longview, which is about 25 miles northeast of New London. Like others, he drove to the school as soon as he heard about the blast and spent hours trying to pull children from the rubble

My grandfather, who was a Navy Seabee during World War II, was not the talkative type. But my mom said he would occasionally reference the disaster at New London.

“He said it was worse than being in Okinawa,” my mom told me.

Careless error #1: This was a detail I should have known, except that I was so busy writing and editing that I didn’t call my mom for a week.

Careless error #2: I’m proud of my accuracy. I double check quotes. I look and look again at statistics and numbers and names. This time, unfortunately, I didn’t check closely enough.

Ellie Goldberg, who wants the New London disaster to be designated as a national day to raise awareness about chemical hazards in schools, runs a great program called “Healthy Kids: The Key to Basics.” Her website is www.healthy-kids.info.

I talked to Ellie early in the story, and she provided some great tips and contacts in New London. Unfortunately, I incorrectly wrote down her organization’s name and forgot to insert the hyphen between “healthy” and “kids” on her website address. It was, quite simply, a mistake that I failed to check.

We have corrected the error online, and we’ll tell our print readers about it in the June edition. But I hope it does not detract from Ellie’s cause, because this careless error does not need to be a costly one.

Glenn Cook, Editor-in-Chief

There’s some new evidence that all the efforts to cajole kids into trading chips and candy for carrot sticks and yogurt really do work.

A widely publicized new study shows that school-based nutrition programs in Philadelphia helped many of their students avoid obesity and make better food choices.

The schools that implemented a broad-based plan to cut back on high-sugar and high-fat foods, coupled with nutrition education, found that fewer students became overweight. In the end, about 7 percent of students who’d taken part in the program had significant weight problems, compared to about 15 percent of students at the schools in the control group.

The study’s lead author, Gary D. Foster, called the findings “a dramatic effect,” although he acknowledged that there were still too many overweight children. The study was published this week in the April edition of Pediatrics. The researchers followed about 1,400 students, grades four through six, in 10 Philadelphia schools for two years. More than half the students were eligible for free or reduced-priced lunches.

First, the schools replaced sodas with milk, juice, or water, and eliminated candy. Strict limits were set on the fat and sugar content of foods, and snack portions were downsized. The students were given rewards, such as raffle tickets for prizes, for choosing healthy options and were encouraged to exercise. And students and teachers spent many hours learning about nutrition and better habits.

While this report highlights the obesity problem and need for school-based interventions, any school dietician will attest to another looming problem: Food is getting more expensive, particularly the fresh fruits and veggies and whole grains that are staples of a nutrition program.

If your district is looking to increase its nutritional offerings or just better manage its food services division, stay tuned for ASBJ’s June issue, which will examine these and other issues facing school cafeterias.

Joetta Sack-Min, Associate Editor

I ran a roundtable session for National Affiliate members at NSBA's annual conference in Orlando at the end of March. One new board member who attended had a story that will sound familiar to many of you.

He was having a problem with another board member. Whenever this member wanted to stonewall an idea, she asked, "is it best practice?"

The gentleman at my session asked, half-jokingly, if a "best practices" manual existed somewhere.

We at ASBJ hope that our Magna Awards program can serve as a starting point toward finding those best practices. For 14 years, we have been recognizing excellence in board and district programs on nearly any topic you can come up with.

Want to know how a district is dealing with dropouts? Magna has it. Want to find out how to engage Spanish-speaking parents with the schools? Magna has it.

Each year, we ask an independent panel of judges to evaluate the 300 or so entries we receive each year and find the standout programs. The entries are in three enrollment categories: under 5,000, 5,000 to 20,000, and over 20,000. This way, districts are competing against other districts of the same size.

We honored the 2008 Magna Award winners at the School Leaders' Luncheon at NSBA's annual conference in Orlando. The three grand prize winners took home checks of $3,500 each; all of the winners are featured in a supplement to ASBJ that ran in April.

Look online at the 2008 winners; then browse through the past winners. You'll find the contact names and e-mails of the district contacts so you can get more details about their wining programs.

While you're on the site, consider applying for a 2009 Magna Award, so you can add your programs to our growing "best practices" list.

Kathleen Vail, Managing Editor

I learned the phrase “24-seven” from a gifted African American student in Prince Georges County, Md. It was 10 years ago, and I was there to do a story on the restructuring of Benjamin Stoddert Middle School, an underperforming school in one of the nation’s largest majority-black counties.

I wonder where he is now, especially after reading a disturbing -- but not altogether surprising -- article in Education Week saying research shows that the greatest widening of the black-white achievement gap occurs not among the general population, but among higher-performing students as they move from elementary school into middle and high school.

In truth, I can’t tell you for sure that he was gifted, just that he was obviously very, very bright. Yet the sad truth was that students like him in Stoddert’s gifted and talented classes would be merely performing on grade level if they moved across the Potomac River to the more affluent areas of Arlington or Fairfax County. That’s what happens, researchers note in the article, if the general population is doing poorly: Teachers tend to teach to the middle, and the middle at Stoddert, located near the distressed neighborhoods that border Washington, D.C., was lower.

After several years of being taught at a level lower than students at more affluent schools, it’s no wonder that the achievement gap tends to widen most noticeably at the top.

There are other possible reasons for this trend. Just as there can be disadvantages in attending a majority black school, some African Americans may feel out of place in an overwhelmingly white one -- and determined not to “act white” and do their best. Out-of-school disparities among families can exacerbate the achievement gap as well: think of the academic advantages provided by computer camps, piano lessons, and private tutoring.

Finally, add the influence of NCLB and its single-minded focus on raising the achievement of students who test below state standards. It’s a worthy goal, of course, but there are fewer of these students in the more affluent schools, and that encourages the teachers in these schools to adopt a more enriching curriculum across the board.

The high-end achievement gap is a serious challenge for board members, teachers, and administrators. But it’s not insurmountable. And educators, who tend to be optimists by nature, know that. The more we learn about the reasons for the achievement gap, the more effectively we can begin to reduce it and move toward a public education system that offers all students the chance to reach their potential. Education is not the only tool in the struggle for equal opportunity and social justice, but it is indispensible.

Lawrence Hardy, Senior Editor

Here’s an interesting statistic: Only about 20 to 30 percent of people who enter principal preparation programs intend to become K-12 school principals, according to the Wallace Foundation.

That’s troubling on many fronts, most obviously because of the looming shortage of school leaders and the importance of strong leadership to turn around struggling schools. And, “that’s a lot of wasted money,” says Jody Spiro, a senior program officer at Wallace.

The foundation is looking for innovative ways to not only ensure that most people who enter these higher education programs actually want to become K-12 principals, but also to find ways to better prepare those candidates. Currently, too many programs focus on managing budgets and administrative tasks, when principals really should be instructional leaders who spend much of their time in classrooms.

Wallace hosted a luncheon for state legislators at the National Conference for State Legislature’s annual federal relations meeting last week in Washington, D.C. Some of the best practices discussed included six-month principal internships, where a principal candidate not only shadowed an experienced principal but also was allowed to oversee programs and make decisions, as well as multi-year mentorships for new principals.

Several principal training programs, including one through Stanford University, have dramatically increased the numbers of graduates who become K-12 principals by more narrowly focusing their programs. Kentucky also has focused its principal training by creating other specialized programs for people who want additional training but don’t want to be principals, such as teacher leadership programs, according to one panelist.

So why do people enter principal training programs when they don’t want to be principals? Many of them want to go into different types of school administration or are merely looking for salary increases, Spiro says.

Joetta Sack-Min, Associate Editor