Post by Moses on May 13, 2004 11:20:44 GMT -5
RAND Finds “Wonder Years” Not Wonderful: New Study Looks at Middle School Students
[EXCELLENT STUDY!!!!!!!]
According to “Focus on the Wonder Years: Challenges Facing the American Middle School,” a recent RAND Corporation study, middle school students in the United States are less enthusiastic about learning conditions and report more physical and emotional problems than their peers in 11 other nations.
The RAND Education study concludes that while there is little empirical evidence that separate middle schools are better for students than other configurations, there is mounting evidence that the transitions that are inherent in such schools compromise some students’ developmental and academic progress.
“While many well-intended and reasoned reforms have been implemented in U.S. middle schools, we are not doing very well compared with the rest of the developed world,” said Jaana Juvonen, a RAND psychologist and lead author of the report. “The idea of a separate school for students in this age group seems to have been misguided in the first place, and major reform efforts are difficult to implement within the current system.”
The first international comparison of middle school students’ well-being and the social-scholastic climate in which they function, the RAND study compared students in American middle schools (grades 6 - 8, primarily for 12 to 14-year-old children) to students in the same age group in Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, England, Finland, Hungary, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Russia and the Slovak Republic.
U.S. middle school students reported more social isolation than students in all but three of the other nations and were among those most likely to say that their schoolmates were neither kind, helpful nor accepting. In addition, more American students than students in other countries said that they don’t enjoy each other’s company.
American middle school students also reported more problems, such as headaches, feeling low and nervousness, than students from all other nations, except for their peers in Israel.
The RAND study examined student achievement, learning conditions, teacher training, parental involvement, school leadership and reform efforts.
On top of previously documented findings that American 8th grade students lag behind students in other nations in science and math achievement, RAND reports that test scores of U.S. middle school students in mathematics, science and reading have risen since the 1970s, but reading scores have remained relatively steady since the 1980s.
Even with such gains, only about one-third of 8th grade students in the United States achieve proficiency in core subjects on achievement tests: 27 percent in mathematics, 32 percent in science and 33 percent in reading, according to the study.
RAND also found that, in contrast with Latino students, African American students have narrowed the achievement gap with white students, but white students nonetheless continue to outperform African Americans by a substantial margin, particularly in mathematics and science.
Middle schools in the United States began to appear during the 1980s when educators endorsed a new school concept intended to reform the traditional junior high school, changing the grade configuration from grades 7-8 or 7-9 to grades 6-8. In addition, new organizational and instructional practices such as interdisciplinary team teaching were introduced in an effort to meet adolescents’ developmental needs.
The study found that team teaching that was supposed to be an underpinning of middle schools is seldom fully implemented. It also concluded that it was unreasonable to expect teachers to team teach and integrate subject matter content across disciplines without any training in collaborative teaching methods or time in their daily schedules to plan such collaborations.
In addition, the report found that many middle school teachers do not have majors, minors or certification in the subjects they teach, particularly in the biological and physical sciences. Moreover, many middle school teachers have no training in the development of adolescents.
Many middle school principals are also inadequately trained to navigate the unique challenges of middle schools. As they spend much of their time on student discipline, their ability to provide academic leadership is limited, according to the study. [The pool for Principals is the brain-dead and the butt kissers-- and the only thing they measure their performance on is discipline]
In addition, RAND found that though parents are often blamed for not being involved in the education of their children beyond elementary school, most middle schools do too little to engage parents in the educational process. [They discourage parent involvement-- it was one of the basic precepts of "middle schools" that parents didn't understand this age group and they did-- nationally]
Juvonen and her colleagues warn that as educators focus on meeting strict new academic standards set by the federal “No Child Left Behind” Act, they may ignore the developmental and social needs of young adolescents. Recent research suggests that students do better in schools that foster both personal support and academic rigor.
More than 9 million students are currently enrolled in public middle schools in the United States. Over the years, middle schools have been criticized by some and blamed for an increase in student behavior problems such as teen alienation, disengagement from school and low academic achievement.
In preparing its report, RAND analyzed a broad array of reports, surveys, and student testing results, as well as results of international studies performed by the World Health Organization and other groups.
Other authors of the report are Vi-Nhuan Lee, Tessa Kaganoff, Catherine Augustine and Louay Constant of RAND Education.
The study was supported by the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation. The foundation, based in New York City, provides the majority of its grant-making support to local nonprofit organizations on the Eastern seaboard that work with young people ages 9 to 24-years old during out-of-school time.
RAND Education conducts research and analysis on a variety of topics, including school reform, educational assessment and accountability, and trends among teachers and teacher training.
A printed copy of “Focus on the Wonder Years: Challenges Facing the American Middle School,” (ISBN: 0-8330-3390-5) can be ordered from RAND’s Distribution Services (order@rand.org or call toll-free (877) 584-8642).
Santa Monica Mirror
2004-05-12
www.smmirror.com/volume5/issue48/rand_finds_wonder.asp
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[EXCELLENT STUDY!!!!!!!]
According to “Focus on the Wonder Years: Challenges Facing the American Middle School,” a recent RAND Corporation study, middle school students in the United States are less enthusiastic about learning conditions and report more physical and emotional problems than their peers in 11 other nations.
The RAND Education study concludes that while there is little empirical evidence that separate middle schools are better for students than other configurations, there is mounting evidence that the transitions that are inherent in such schools compromise some students’ developmental and academic progress.
“While many well-intended and reasoned reforms have been implemented in U.S. middle schools, we are not doing very well compared with the rest of the developed world,” said Jaana Juvonen, a RAND psychologist and lead author of the report. “The idea of a separate school for students in this age group seems to have been misguided in the first place, and major reform efforts are difficult to implement within the current system.”
The first international comparison of middle school students’ well-being and the social-scholastic climate in which they function, the RAND study compared students in American middle schools (grades 6 - 8, primarily for 12 to 14-year-old children) to students in the same age group in Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, England, Finland, Hungary, Israel, Latvia, Lithuania, Russia and the Slovak Republic.
U.S. middle school students reported more social isolation than students in all but three of the other nations and were among those most likely to say that their schoolmates were neither kind, helpful nor accepting. In addition, more American students than students in other countries said that they don’t enjoy each other’s company.
American middle school students also reported more problems, such as headaches, feeling low and nervousness, than students from all other nations, except for their peers in Israel.
The RAND study examined student achievement, learning conditions, teacher training, parental involvement, school leadership and reform efforts.
On top of previously documented findings that American 8th grade students lag behind students in other nations in science and math achievement, RAND reports that test scores of U.S. middle school students in mathematics, science and reading have risen since the 1970s, but reading scores have remained relatively steady since the 1980s.
Even with such gains, only about one-third of 8th grade students in the United States achieve proficiency in core subjects on achievement tests: 27 percent in mathematics, 32 percent in science and 33 percent in reading, according to the study.
RAND also found that, in contrast with Latino students, African American students have narrowed the achievement gap with white students, but white students nonetheless continue to outperform African Americans by a substantial margin, particularly in mathematics and science.
Middle schools in the United States began to appear during the 1980s when educators endorsed a new school concept intended to reform the traditional junior high school, changing the grade configuration from grades 7-8 or 7-9 to grades 6-8. In addition, new organizational and instructional practices such as interdisciplinary team teaching were introduced in an effort to meet adolescents’ developmental needs.
The study found that team teaching that was supposed to be an underpinning of middle schools is seldom fully implemented. It also concluded that it was unreasonable to expect teachers to team teach and integrate subject matter content across disciplines without any training in collaborative teaching methods or time in their daily schedules to plan such collaborations.
In addition, the report found that many middle school teachers do not have majors, minors or certification in the subjects they teach, particularly in the biological and physical sciences. Moreover, many middle school teachers have no training in the development of adolescents.
Many middle school principals are also inadequately trained to navigate the unique challenges of middle schools. As they spend much of their time on student discipline, their ability to provide academic leadership is limited, according to the study. [The pool for Principals is the brain-dead and the butt kissers-- and the only thing they measure their performance on is discipline]
In addition, RAND found that though parents are often blamed for not being involved in the education of their children beyond elementary school, most middle schools do too little to engage parents in the educational process. [They discourage parent involvement-- it was one of the basic precepts of "middle schools" that parents didn't understand this age group and they did-- nationally]
Juvonen and her colleagues warn that as educators focus on meeting strict new academic standards set by the federal “No Child Left Behind” Act, they may ignore the developmental and social needs of young adolescents. Recent research suggests that students do better in schools that foster both personal support and academic rigor.
More than 9 million students are currently enrolled in public middle schools in the United States. Over the years, middle schools have been criticized by some and blamed for an increase in student behavior problems such as teen alienation, disengagement from school and low academic achievement.
In preparing its report, RAND analyzed a broad array of reports, surveys, and student testing results, as well as results of international studies performed by the World Health Organization and other groups.
Other authors of the report are Vi-Nhuan Lee, Tessa Kaganoff, Catherine Augustine and Louay Constant of RAND Education.
The study was supported by the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation. The foundation, based in New York City, provides the majority of its grant-making support to local nonprofit organizations on the Eastern seaboard that work with young people ages 9 to 24-years old during out-of-school time.
RAND Education conducts research and analysis on a variety of topics, including school reform, educational assessment and accountability, and trends among teachers and teacher training.
A printed copy of “Focus on the Wonder Years: Challenges Facing the American Middle School,” (ISBN: 0-8330-3390-5) can be ordered from RAND’s Distribution Services (order@rand.org or call toll-free (877) 584-8642).
Santa Monica Mirror
2004-05-12
www.smmirror.com/volume5/issue48/rand_finds_wonder.asp
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