Effects of Extracurricular Participation During Middle School on Academic Motivation and Achievement at Grade 9

BY Myung Hee Im, Jan N. Hughes, Qian Cao and Oi-Man Kwok

We investigated the effect of participating in two domains of extracurricular activities (sports and performance arts/clubs) in Grades 7 and 8 on Grade 9 academic motivation and letter grades, above baseline performance. Participants were 483 students (55% male; 33% Euro-American, 25% African American, and 39% Latino). Propensity score weighting controlled for potential confounders in all analyses. Delayed (Grade 8 only) and continuous participation (Grades 7 and 8) in sports predicted competence beliefs and valuing education; delayed and continuous participation in performance arts/clubs predicted teacher-rated engagement and letter grades. Benefits of participation were similar across gender and ethnicity; however, Latino youth were least likely to participate in extracurricular activities. Implications for reducing ethnic and income disparities in educational attainment are discussed.

An extensive body of research conducted over the past 25 years has documented positive associations between adolescents’ participation in school-sponsored extracurricular activities and diverse benefits, including academic success and psychosocial well-being (for reviews, see Farb & Matjasko, 2012; Feldman & Matjasko, 2005). Despite a large body of research documenting benefits of participation, few studies have investigated the benefits of participating in extracurricular activities during the critical middle school years on academic outcomes (for exception, see Fredricks & Eccles, 2008). Furthermore, very few of these studies have used rigorous methods to control for the effect of differences between youth who participate and those who do not participate in extracurricular activities on variables measured prior to participation that predict both participation in extracurricular activities and outcomes. Thus, a finding of differences between participation groups may be due to these preexisting confounds rather than to participation. Drawing from bioecological theory and using propensity score analyses to control for potential confounds, the present study investigates the effects of participation in two broad domains of extracurricular activities (sports and performance arts and clubs) during middle school on academic motivation and achievement in Grade 9.

A Bioecological Perspective on Extracurricular Participation

According to the bioecological model of development (Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 2006), individuals’ transactions in particular contexts across time are the proximal drivers of development. The power of proximal processes to influence development depends on the person, the context, and the timing of the transactions. In essence, bioecological models posit that the same experience or transaction may affect developmental processes differently depending on characteristics of the person, characteristics of the context, and the timing of the experience (both in terms of the person’s age and the regularity and duration of the experience). Each of these three dimensions is pertinent to understanding effects of extracurricular participation on youths’ development.

Activity Context

Youth participate in a variety of contexts (e.g., school, home, communities, neighborhoods, and peer groups) that shape their behaviors, motivation, values, competencies, and views of self and the world. Extracurricular settings are considered important contexts for development, and a youth’s transactions within these settings (e.g., interacting with peers and adult leaders, following rules and routines, setting and monitoring performance goals, and confronting and overcoming challenges) are considered proximal drivers of development (Fredricks & Simpkins, 2013).

Diverse extracurricular activities such as sports, music, and clubs share certain features that distinguish them from many of the adolescent’s other contexts. For example, extracurricular activities are often structured in ways that facilitate high-quality peer interactions and the development of prosocial friendships (Fredricks & Simpkins, 2012;Simpkins, Vest, Delgado, & Price, 2012). Additionally, youth report a greater emphasis on teamwork and social skills in extracurricular activities, relative to school and other activities, and report more opportunities for initiative, managing emotions, and identity work (Larson, Hansen, & Moneta, 2006).

In addition to differences between extracurricular activity contexts and other contexts, researchers have suggested that different types of activities, such as sports versus music or arts, offer different experiences that may account for differential effects on development (Denault & Poulin, 2009a; Fredricks & Eccles, 2008). For example, in a large sample of 11th graders, students reported experiencing more opportunities for initiative (perseverance and goal achievement), emotional regulation, and teamwork in sports than in other extracurricular activities but fewer opportunities for identity work, positive peer relationships, and experiences that build social capital and prepare youth for college (Larson et al., 2006).

Consistent with a finding of differences in developmental experiences across different activity contexts, researchers have found differences in outcomes associated with participation in sport and non-sport (e.g., academic clubs or performing arts) activities. Specifically, participation in performing arts (e.g., theater, choir, and band) and academic and service clubs is more consistently related to higher grades and academic values than is participation in sports (Denault & Poulin, 2009a; Fredricks & Eccles, 2008). Conversely, participation in sports may be more consistently related to a higher sense of school belonging and closer social ties among students, parents, and schools than is participation in non-sport activities (Broh, 2002; Villarreal, 2013). Sports participation but not participation in performing arts/clubs has also been associated with higher levels of alcohol use and other risky behavior (Eccles & Barber, 1999; Fredricks & Eccles, 2008). These finding may be due to differences in peer group experiences in sports and non-sport activities. For example, Denault and Poulin (2009b) found that boys with behavior problems are more likely to self-select into sport activities than non-sport activities.

Activity Timing

Bioecological theory assumes that the timing of transactions within and across contexts is important. Those transactions that occur more regularly and for a longer period of time have a greater influence of development. Extracurricular activities typically involve regular and frequent participation, which may account, in part, for their effects on development. The current study focuses on the duration of participation. Specifically, duration in the current study refers to the number of years a youth participates in an extracurricular activity. More years of participation is expected to yield more benefits than fewer years due to the time it takes to build meaningful social ties with peers and adult leaders and the skills necessary to perform well. In a review of studies on participation duration, Bohnert, Fredricks, and Randall (2010) concluded that participation for two years yields more benefits than participation for one year and that additional years of participation beyond two may provide further benefits. Importantly, there is a dearth of studies examining effects of consistency or stability of participation. Beginning involvement in an activity one year and not continuing it the following year may signal negative experiences in that activity, which could negatively impact students’ liking for and engagement in school. Based on this reasoning, one might expect that students who participate in one year but discontinue participation the second year (discontinued group) would gain fewer benefits from participation than students who do not begin participation until the second year (delayed start group) even though both groups of students participated for an equivalent period of time.

Person Variables

Person variables refer to characteristics such as age, gender, and ethnicity as well as individual differences in physical appearance, mental and emotional resources, and motivation. With respect to age, the same experience may have different developmental impacts at different ages. Although the majority of research on extracurricular participation has occurred at the high school level, the effects of participation may be particularly strong in middle school, when young adolescents are undergoing rapid biological, cognitive, and social changes. For example, early adolescence is a time of increased susceptibility to the influence of one’s peers and an increased desire for autonomy from parents (Brown & Larson, 2009).

The middle school years are of critical importance to students’ long-term academic attainment (Alexander, Entwisle, & Kabbani, 2001). The normative decline in students’ academic motivation and achievement at the transition to middle school has been explained by a lack of fit between the developmental needs of the youth adolescent and the capacity of the school to meet those needs (Eccles, Wigfield, Midgley, & Reuman, 1993). The transition often brings larger and complex peer ecology, a departmentalized curriculum, and less support from teachers (Eccles & Roeser, 2009). In the face of these challenges, many students disengage from school during the middle school years. The present study aims to understand the effect of extracurricular participation during this period among an ethnically diverse, predominantly low socioeconomic status (SES) sample of youth who entered first grade with low literacy skills. Low literacy skills in first grade are one of the strongest predictors of subsequent academic failure (Sonnenschein, Stapleton, & Benson, 2010).

Research on individual characteristics associated with benefit from extracurricular participation has been restricted primarily to gender and ethnicity. Although boys and girls are equally likely to participate in extracurricular activities, boys are more likely to participate in sports, whereas girls are more likely to participate in performance and fine arts (Denault & Poulin, 2009b; Eccles & Barber, 1999; Fredricks & Eccles, 2008). Furthermore, different factors may predict participation for boys and girls (Denault & Poulin, 2009b; Feldman & Matjasko, 2007). Despite gender differences in predictors and activity contexts, the effects of extracurricular participation are generally similar across gender, with gender moderation inconsistently found (Fredricks & Eccles, 2006,2008).

With respect to ethnicity, researchers have found that Latino/Hispanic students are less likely to participate in extracurricular activities than are other ethnic groups (Lugaila, 2003; National Center for Education Statistics, 2012; Ream & Rumberger, 2008). Using a national data set, Feldman and Matjasko (2007) reported that of youth in Grades 7 through 12, 36.7% of Latino students did not participate in any extracurricular activity, compared to 21.0% of White/Euro-American students and 25.6% of African American students. Scholars have suggested that the lower levels of participation among Latino youth may be a result of language barriers, a lack of parental awareness of the benefits of participation, and Latino cultural values of duty to the family, which may require youth to be wage earners or help with other family obligations (Peguero, 2010; Shannon, 2006).

Comparative studies find that all ethnic groups benefit from extracurricular participation, even after adjusting for multiple self-selection factors (Marsh & Kleitman, 2002). The few comparative studies of multiethnic samples of youth report that Latino students benefit more from participation than do African American or Euro-American students (Hull, Kilbourne, Reece, & Husanini, 2008; Villarreal, 2013). For example, using data from a large school district in Oregon, Towe (2012) found a stronger association between extracurricular participation and GPA for Latino than for non-Latino students. Some authors have suggested that extracurricular participation is especially beneficial to Latino students because it fosters social integration at school, thereby increasing access to non-Latino sources of social capital (Ream & Rumberger, 2008; Simpkins, O’Donnell, Delgado, & Becnel, 2011).

Selection Effects

In addition to the aforementioned substantive gaps in the literature on effects of extracurricular participation, prior studies have not adequately controlled for potential confounds that may account for an association between extracurricular participation and outcomes. Despite an extensive body of research documenting associations between extracurricular participation and academic motivation and achievement, the fact that students choose to participate, or not, in these activities poses a serious obstacle to reaching conclusions regarding a causal role for participation. The crux of the problem is that students are not randomly assigned to participation; rather, students select (or are recruited into) these activities. Furthermore, many students, family, and school variables that are associated with selection into participation versus nonparticipation are also associated with the measured outcomes. For example, student demographic variables (e.g., age, gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status) and individual characteristics (e.g., interests, competencies, social and behavioral adjustment, academic achievement), family variables (e.g., parent involvement in school and encouragement for participation), and school factors (e.g., size, availability of opportunities) predict whether students participate or not in extracurricular activities as well as the type and intensity of participation (Denault & Poulin, 2009b; Feldman & Matjasko, 2007).

Due to potential selection effects, a finding that participants and nonparticipants differ at some future point on outcomes of interest may tell us little about the effect of participation on these outcomes. A few researchers investigating effects of extracurricular participation on development have employed a number of strategies for minimizing selection effects. The most common strategy is the use of covariate analyses in which the effects of a limited number of confounding variables are statistically controlled (Broh, 2002; Fredricks & Eccles, 2006; Gardner, Roth, & Brooks-Gunn, 2008). However, these statistical adjustments can employ only a limited number of observed covariates that may not capture all of the preexisting differences between participants and nonparticipants. Additionally, these statistical adjustments make a number of critical assumptions about the relationship between the covariates and the outcomes across the groups of interest that are rarely tested (Shadish, Cook, & Campbell, 2002).

Prior reviews of the literature on extracurricular participation reflect a consensus that improved methods to minimize threat differences between participation groups prior to participation are needed to move the field forward. In 2005, Feldman and Matjasko concluded that “it is necessary to reduce selection bias to gauge participation’s true impact” (p. 202). In their 2012 review, Farb and Matjasko noted that despite repeated calls for better controls for selection bias, “there has not been any movement in this direction” since 2005 (p. 45).

Propensity Score Analysis

Increasingly, social science researchers have employed propensity scores to minimize selection effects in nonexperimental studies. A propensity score is defined as the conditional probability of assignment to a particular “treatment” given a vector of observed covariates (Rosenbaum & Rubin, 1984). Propensity score analysis generates a single index—the propensity score—that summarizes information across potential confounds. Procedures such as matching and weighting can then be used to equate the participant and nonparticipant students on their propensity scores (West et al., 2014). To the degree that equating is achieved on all potential confounders, the propensity score analysis produces an unbiased estimate of the average effect of participation on students. Although one can never be certain that all potential confounders are equated, or balanced, across groups, use of a broad set of covariates known to be associated with the treatment and the outcome minimizes this risk (West et al., 2014). To the authors’ best knowledge, no study has employed propensity score analyses in estimating the effect of extracurricular participation on academic outcomes.

Study Purpose and Research Hypotheses

Given the aforementioned limitations of prior research on effects of extracurricular participation on academic functioning, the present study investigated the role of activity context, duration of participation, and the youth’s gender and ethnicity on effects of participation in extracurricular activities during the middle school grades on academic motivation and achievement. Specifically, the current study investigated the effects of timing of participation across Grades 7 and 8 (i.e., continuous, delayed, discontinued, and no participation) in two broad activity contexts (sports and performance arts/clubs) on students’ Grade 9 academic outcomes, above baseline performance on these outcomes. The potential moderating roles of two person variables, gender and ethnicity, were also investigated.

Based on research suggesting that different activity contexts may influence different aspects of academic motivation and achievement (Blomfield & Barber, 2010; Denault, Poulin, & Pedersen, 2009), we assessed four distinct but related outcomes. Specifically, academic competence beliefs and subjective valuing of academic achievement were selected as outcomes based on extensive evidence of their association with academic effort and attainment (Wigfield, Cambria, & Eccles, 2012). Students’ course grades and teacher-rated behavioral engagement were selected as outcomes based on the strong association between these outcomes at Grade 9 and successful completion of high school and enrollment in postsecondary education (Donegan, 2008; Janosz, Archambault, Morizot, & Pagani, 2008). Importantly, propensity score analysis was employed to strengthen the basis for reaching causal conclusions regarding effects of extracurricular participation on subsequent academic motivation and achievement.

Based on theory and empirical findings discussed previously, we expected boys would participate at a higher rate than girls in sports but that girls would participate at a higher rate than boys in performance arts/clubs. We expected Latino students to participate in both activity domains at a lower rate than African American or Euro-American youth. Relative to students who did not participate in extracurricular activities in Grades 7 or 8 (nonparticipants), we expected students who participated in Grades 7 and 8 (continuous participants) and students who participated in Grade 8 only (delayed participants) would perform better on Grade 9 outcomes. However, we expected students who participated only in Grade 7 (discontinued participants) in either activity domain would not differ from nonparticipants on Grade 9 outcomes.

With respect to activity context, based on the evidence that participation in performance arts (e.g., band and chorus) and academic clubs is more consistently predictive of academic performance than is sport participation, we expected participation in performing arts/clubs would predict teacher-awarded letter grades and teacher-rated engagement. Based on the reasoning that all school-sponsored activities provide a sense of belonging to school and valuing of school, we expected both activity contexts would predict academic competence beliefs and educational values. With respect to gender and ethnic moderation of participation effects, we expected girls and boys would benefit similarly from participation and that Latino students would benefit more from participation than Euro-American or African American students.

These research questions were pursued with a predominantly low-income sample of youth who were recruited into the current longitudinal study on the basis of academic risk (see Participants section). Although lower achieving and low SES youth are less likely to participate in extracurricular activities, they may be more likely to benefit from participation. For example, participation in extracurricular activities in middle and high school reduced the probability of dropping out of school only for students with low academic and social competence in middle school (Mahoney & Cairns, 1997). A finding of an effect of participation on these outcomes would suggest that increasing participation in middle school is a viable strategy for increasing the educational attainment of students with elevated risk for school failure.

Methods

Overview

Data on students’ extracurricular participation was obtained in interviews when students were in Grades 7 and 8. We selected these grades because a wide range of extracurricular activities, including sports, performance arts, and service and academic clubs, were available at these grades on each school campus. Outcomes were assessed at baseline (Year 5 in the longitudinal study, when students were in Grades 4 or 5) and Grade 9. A difference in the grade at which the baseline measure was administered is due to the fact that some students repeated an elementary grade (n = 156, 31.5%). For teacher-rated engagement and reading and math achievement, the same outcome measure was used at baseline (Grades 4 or 5) and Grade 9. For teacher-awarded letter grades (which were typically provided by the language arts teacher), the baseline measure was the score on a measure of reading achievement. As described in the following measures section, developmentally appropriate measures of student-perceived academic competence and valuing of education were used at Grade 9 and baseline. Different sources reported on different outcomes: Students reported on their academic competence beliefs and valuing of education, teachers reported on students’ letter grades, and reading achievement was assessed on an individually administered test. Bilingual students were interviewed and tested in the language in which they were more proficient, based on scores on the Woodcock-Muñoz Language Test (Woodcock & Muñoz-Sandoval, 1993), by bilingual examiners.

Participants

Participants were 483 students recruited in the fall of 2000 or 2001 into a larger longitudinal study (N = 784) when they were in Grade 1. Data on participation in extracurricular were collected when these students were in Grades 7 and 8 (i.e., years 2007–2009).

Students in the larger longitudinal sample were enrolled in one of three school districts (one urban and two small city districts) in Texas and were selected into the study on the basis of scoring below the median on a district-administered test of literacy administered in the spring of kindergarten or the fall of Grade 1. Based on school records, School District A (student population = 13,558) had an ethnic distribution of 38% White/Euro-American, 37% Latino/Hispanic, 25% African American, and less than 1% other. District B (student population = 24,429) had an ethnic distribution of 35% White/Euro-American, 30% Latino/Hispanic, 30% African American, and 5% other. District C (student population = 7,424) had an ethnic distribution of 67% White/Euro-American, 12% Latino/Hispanic, 12% African American, and 9% other. Additional inclusionary criteria for the larger study included speaking English or Spanish, not receiving special education services other than speech and language services, and not having been previously retained in Grade 1. Of the 1,374 children eligible to participate in the longitudinal study, written parent consent for participation for 5 years was received for 784 (65%). Students with and without consent did not differ on a broad array of variables. Details on recruitment are reported in Hughes, Luo, Kwok, and Loyd (2008).

At the end of the first five years of participation in the study, parental consent for continued participation was received for 569 of the 784 participants. Almost all nonconsent was due to nonresponse. Attrition analyses found no differences between participants and nonparticipants on a wide range of variables assessed when students were in first grade, including gender, parent education level, literacy scores, reading and math achievement, IQ, ethnicity, and bilingual status. Participants (54.7% male) were 12.56 years of age (SD = .37) at Grade 7, 65.9% were economically disadvantaged based on income eligibility for free or reduced lunch, and 41.5% of parents’ highest level of educational attainment was a high school diploma or less. The ethnic composition of the sample was 33.1% Euro-American, 25.3% African American, 38.5% Latino/Hispanic (of whom 32.0% were enrolled in bilingual education at Grade 5), and 3.1% Other. Participants were enrolled in 64 schools during Grade 7 and 72 schools in Grade 9. The increase in the number of schools reflects the increased geographical dispersal of the sample over time. At Grade 7, participants’ mean reading age-standard scores from the Woodcock-Johnson III (Woodcock, McGrew, & Mather, 2001) or its Spanish-language equivalent (Batería III Woodcock-Munoz; Woodcock, Muñoz-Sandoval, McGrew, Mather, & Schrank, 2004) was 96.44 (SD = 14.13).

Measures

Extracurricular Participation

In individual interviews at school, the interviewer asked students to indicate if they participated that year in each of four activity contexts: (a) sports; (b) performance arts, fine arts, or music; (c) academic clubs; and (d) other school activities such as student council, newspaper, or service activities. For each activity category, students were given examples of activities that fit that category (e.g., examples of sports activities included football, baseball, cheerleading, pep squad, and tennis). Students were asked to name the specific activity in which they engaged, and their answers were written verbatim. Verbatim responses were coded into activity domain by two graduate assistants, whose agreement was 98%. Students were asked to report only activities that were sponsored by the school and not part of the regular school day. Thus, if students were in a drama class but did not participate in drama activities outside class time (e.g., practices or performances after school hours), that activity was not counted. Based on the relatively small number of students participating in academic clubs and other school activities such as student council and prior research finding similar profiles of participants across these activities (Feldman & Matjasko, 2007), these activities were combined with performance arts and music into a performance arts/clubs category. Although data on intensity of participation were collected, for the present study, participation in each broad activity category (sports and performance arts/clubs) was defined as a dichotomous variable.

Four different duration patterns in participation across two consecutive grades (i.e., Grades 7 and 8) were possible: (1) continuous: students participated for both years; (2) discontinued: students participated only in Grade 7; (3) delayed: students participated only in Grade 8; and (4) nonparticipation: student did not participate in either year. Nonparticipants were the reference group for the three contrasts.

Competence Beliefs and Valuing of Educational Attainment

At Grade 9, students completed the 11-item Academic Competence and Effort Beliefs Scale (α = .89) and the 10-item Value of Education Scale of the Motivation for Education Attainment Questionnaire (α = .85) (masked), a multidimensional measure of motivation to complete high school and pursue postsecondary education. Example Academic Competence and Effort Beliefs items include “I am on track to graduate from high school” and “Nothing will get in the way of my going to college.” Example Value of Education items include “If I work hard in school, I will get a better job than the kids who don’t try hard” and “School is not that important for future success” (reverse scored). The scale has demonstrated good construct and criterion-related validity in an at-risk sample of Grade 9 students (Cham, West, Hughes, and Im, 2015).

At baseline, students’ academic competence beliefs and educational values were assessed with the Competence Beliefs and Subjective Task Values Questionnaire (Wigfield et al., 1997). Five items assess competence beliefs in each subject (i.e., reading and math). Specifically, children were asked how good they were in that subject, how good they were relative to the other things they do, how good they were relative to other children, how well they expected to do in the future in that subject, and how good they thought they would be at learning something new in that subject. Students indicated their response to each item by pointing to a thermometer numbered 1 to 30. The endpoint and midpoint of each scale was labeled with a verbal descriptor of the meaning of that scale (e.g., with 1 indicating not at all good, 15 indicating ok, and 30 indicating one of the best). Children rated their subjective valuing of reading and math by indicating how interesting/fun each subject was, how important they thought being good in each subject was compared to other activities, and how useful they thought each subject was using a similar 1 to 30 scale. Wigfield et al. (1997) reported that children’s reports on this measure were moderately correlated with teacher and parent report of competencies for children as young as third grade. Based on moderate correlations between reading and math competency scores (r = .30) and reading and math subjective valuing scores (r = .54), a mean academic competence beliefs score and a mean academic valuing score were computed for reading and math.

Letter Grades

Students’ language arts teachers were asked to report the letter grade (from A to F, with A = 4 and F = 0) that the student received in his or her class for the most recent grading period. Language arts was selected because all students take language arts in Grade 9. In a few cases (7%), when a language arts teacher was not available to report on students’ grades, another teacher who knew the student well reported on the student’s grades in his or her class.

Teacher-Rated Classroom Engagement

The same teacher who reported on students’ grades also rated students’ classroom engagement using an 11-item questionnaire adapted from Skinner, Zimmer-Gembeck, and Connell (1998). Items assess effort, persistence, concentration, and interest. Example items include: “tries hard to do well in school,” “participates in class discussion,” “pays attention in class,” and “just wants to learn only what he/she has to in school” (reverse scored). Teachers were asked to indicate the extent to which each statement was true on a 1 (not true at all) to 4 (very true) scale. The scale demonstrates good factorial validity (masked) and internal consistency (α at baseline and Grade 9 was .92 and .91, respectively).

Reading Achievement

The Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Achievement (WJ-III; Woodcock et al., 2001) is an individually administered measure of academic achievement for individuals ages 2 to adulthood. The WJ-III Broad Reading W Scores, which are based on the Letter-Word Identification, Reading Fluency, and Passage Comprehension subtests, were used. Extensive studies document the reliability and construct validity of the WJ-III (Woodcock et al., 2001). Spanish language–dominant children were administered the Batería III, the equivalent Spanish version of the WJ-III (Woodcock et al., 2004), by bilingual examiners.

Covariates for Propensity Score Analysis

A total of 44 covariates (potential confounders), all of which were measured in Grades 4 or 5, prior to opportunity to participate in middle school activities, were used to estimate the propensity scores of students who did and did not participate in extracurricular activities (see propensity score estimation under Study 1 and Study 2 in the following). These 44 covariates (listed in Table 1) were selected to be as comprehensive as possible, including variables that have been shown in prior research to be associated with extracurricular participation and with measures of academic motivation and achievement. These variables were assessed with direct child testing and interviews (e.g., measures of language proficiency, academic achievement, perceived teacher-student support, perceived competence beliefs in reading and math, value of reading and math, and perceived social acceptance), teacher questionnaires (e.g., behavioral, academic, and social functioning), parent questionnaires (e.g., family demographics, educational aspirations, and child behavioral and social functioning), and school records (e.g., child ethnicity, age, gender, and bilingual class placement).

Table 1

List of Covariates for Propensity Score Analyses

Data Analytic Procedure

Propensity Score Analysis

As discussed in the introduction, the first step in propensity score analysis is to estimate each student’s propensity score for each participation category (i.e., conditional probability of being in each participation category) given the student’s scores on the covariates. The second step is to equate the estimated propensity scores’ distributions between the participants and nonparticipants. The third step is to check the balance of the distributions of the set of 44 covariates between the participating and nonparticipating students. Each step is described in greater detail in the following.

Estimation

We estimated two propensity scores depending on two activity domains, sports and performance arts/clubs. The propensity score for the sports was the probability of a student’s participating in sports in Grade 7 versus not participating in sports. The propensity score for the performance arts/club activity was the probability of a student participating in performance arts/clubs in Grade 7 versus not participating in performance arts/clubs in Grade 7.

To estimate propensity scores, we used the random forests method (Breiman, 2001) under the R package version 3.1.0 (Strobl, Boulesteix, Kneib, Augustin, & Zeileis, 2008). According to previous studies (Lee, Lessler, & Stuart, 2010), the random forests method reduces bias in the estimate of the effect of a treatment (i.e., extracurricular participation) on outcomes by identifying complex and nonlinear relationships of covariates with students’ participation status.

Equating

With the estimated propensity score, we employed weighting approach using the odds method (Hirano, Imbens, & Ridder, 2003) under R package. In this method, each student who belonged to a particular participation category was given a weight of 1.00, whereas nonparticipants were given a weight of Formula , where Formula is the nonparticipating student’s estimated propensity score. This weighting procedure reflects survey sampling weighting procedures to estimate parameters and their associated standard errors (Asparouhov, 2005). With this weighting by the odds method, one can estimate the effect of activity participation for students who did not actually participate compared to closely equated students who participated (Schafer & Kang, 2008).

Covariates Distribution Balance

To evaluate the effectiveness of the propensity score equating procedure, we checked the balance of the distributions of the completely observed values of the covariates across participants’ groups and the missing data pattern of the covariates between the participating and nonparticipating students (Rosenbaum & Rubin, 1984). Specifically, using the weighted propensity scores, we calculated the absolute standardized mean difference (SMD) of the 44 covariates between participation groups (Rubin, 2001;Stuart, 2010). An SMD score of 0 indicates perfect balance (i.e., no difference in SMD).

Effect of Extracurricular Participation on Students’ Outcomes

Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) was employed to examine the hypothesized model using Mplus version 7.2 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998–2014). We used students’ weighted propensity scores with WEIGHT function. In data analysis, we calculated intraclass correlation (ICC) for school since school characteristics such as size is associated with participation (Feldman & Matjasko, 2007) to determine the necessity of accounting for the data dependency. We then used TYPE=COMPLEX in combination with the CLUSTER function (i.e., school at Grade 9) to take into account the data dependency (i.e., students nested within schools).

The effects of duration (timing) of extracurricular participation by activity domain in Grades 7 and 8 were estimated separately for each of the four Grade 9 academic outcomes (competence beliefs, valuing of education, teacher-rated engagement, and teacher-awarded letter grades), controlling for prior performance on the outcomes. Tests of the effects of sport duration on outcomes used students’ weighted propensity score for participating in sports in Grade 7. Tests of the effects of performance arts/clubs’ duration used students’ weighted propensity score for participating in performance arts/clubs in Grade 7. We created four categories representing groups with different duration patterns: continuous, delayed, discontinued, and nonparticipation. We then created the three dummy variables (i.e., continuous, delayed, and discontinued), using the nonparticipation group as the reference group (see Measures section for more details), which was assigned a value of 0. Each of the other groups was given a value of 1 on the dummy variable that contrasted it with the reference group in the analysis and a value of 0 on the other dummy variables. With this dummy variable coding approach, effects can be directly interpreted as differences in effects of each pattern of duration (i.e., continuous, delayed, and discontinued participation) relative to effect of the reference group (i.e., nonparticipation) in that domain. For example, the effect of continuous participation equals the effect of continuous participation minus the effect of no participation. When more than one participation pattern had a significant effect on an outcome, we then conducted post hoc tests to determine if one pattern had a stronger effect than another pattern. For the post hoc tests, we used the Wald test.

We first allowed the relation to vary between the two effects and each outcome separately. Next, we imposed equality constraints on these relations. Next, using multiple group analysis, we investigated whether student’s gender (boys and girls) or ethnicity (Euro-American, African American, and Latino students) moderated the effects of different duration pattern and Grade 9 outcomes.

Results

Descriptive Statistics

Table 2 presents the number and percentage of students participating in each broad activity domain for Grades 7 and 8 and the number of students in each duration pattern, separately by gender and ethnicity. Table 3 presents descriptive statistics for the outcomes in the hypothesized models. The variables were screened for non-normality and extreme values. None of the variables used in the analyses exhibited levels of skewness or kurtosis associated with problematic tests of fit or standard errors (West, Finch, & Curran, 1995). Each baseline score measured at Year 5 was predictive of the corresponding outcome at Grade 9 (range, .15–.29). All outcomes were positively correlated with each other. The associations between education belief and academic competence belief and between teacher-rated engagement and letter grade were strong (.52 and .65, respectively).

Table 2

Frequency of Extracurricular Participation Status by Gender and Ethnicity (N = 483)

Table 3

Correlations and Descriptive Statistics for Outcomes at Grade 9 and Baseline Variables of Outcomes at Grade 5 (N = 483)

Covariates Balance Across Participating and Nonparticipating Groups

The selected covariates cover a broad range of dimensions (demographics, performance, behavior, motivation, social, personality, parent involvement, and home-school relationship) and sources (archival, performance, student report, parent report, and teacher report). Figure 1 shows the balance measures before and after weighting the sample. After weighting by the odds method together with the random forests propensity scores, the balance improved the distributions of propensity scores and the distributions of the observed values of the covariates between the participating and nonparticipating students. Furthermore, after propensity score equating, the covariates had lower standard mean differences. Specifically, SMDs of covariates selected on the basis of high correlations with the outcomes ranged from 0 to 0.23, indicating good balance (Ho, Imai, King, & Stuart, 2007). Additional details on covariate balance are available from the corresponding author. We concluded that the weighting procedure successfully equated the participating and nonparticipating students on the set of 44 covariates measured in or prior to Year 5 (before any student had begun middle school).

Figure 1.

The boxplots of propensity scores between participation and nonparticipation students before and after propensity score equating using the weighted odds method. parti = participation group; non-parti = nonparticipating group.

Gender and Ethnic Differences in Participation

In responding to our first hypothesis, we tested gender and ethnic differences in participation in sports and performance arts/clubs as well as in nonparticipation at either Grade 7 or Grade 8. Because results were similar across grades in terms of direction and magnitude, findings only for Grade 8 only are detailed here.

Gender Differences

As expected, girls were less likely to participate in sports than boys (z-ratio = −2.78, p = .006) but were more likely than boys to participate in performance art/clubs (z-ratio= 2.71, p = .007). Although boys and girls differed in what activity they selected, they did not differ in whether they were involved in any extracurricular activities or not.

Ethnic Differences

Also as expected, Latino students were less likely than African American (z-ratio = −2.14, p = .032) or Euro-American (z-ratio = −3.16, p = .002) students to participate in sports. African American and Euro-Americans did not differ in their rate of participation in sports. In the domain of performance arts/clubs, Latino students were less likely to participate than Euro-American students (z-ratio = −2.12, p = .034), whose participation was similar to that of African Americans. When considering ethnic differences in status as participating or not in any extracurricular activity, Latino were less likely to participate than African American (z-ratio = −2.07, p = .038) or Euro-American youth (z-ratio = −3.68, p < .001), who did not differ from each other.

Effect of Duration of Participation on Outcomes

First, at the school level we calculated the intraclass correlation for each Grade 9 outcome. The ICCs for competence belief, valuing of education, teacher-rated classroom engagement, and teacher-awarded letter grade were .07, .00, .03, and .04, respectively. Thus, all analyses took into account the nonindependent data structure (i.e., students nested within schools).

We then tested the effect of the different duration patterns across Grades 7 and 8 on outcomes at Grade 9, separately by the activity domain (i.e., sports or performance arts/clubs). The hypothesized ANCOVA models we examined with Mplus are the saturated path models (with degrees of freedom of zero) in the structural equation modeling (SEM) framework. Therefore, we do not report the fit indices due to perfect fit for all models in the study. Table 4 shows the standardized parameter estimates, corresponding standard error, and p value for each effect. Given that the reference group was the nonparticipation group, effects can be directly interpreted as differences in effects of each pattern of duration (i.e., continuous, delayed, and discontinued participation) relative to nonparticipation in that domain. Results for duration patterns will be presented separately for each activity category.

Table 4

Standardized Effect of Different Pattern of Duration by Activity Type During Middle School (Grades7 and 8) on Grade 9 Outcomes

Continuous participation in sports had a significant positive effect on Grade 9 academic competence beliefs (β = .14, SE = .04, p < .001) and valuing of education (β = .16, SE = .05, p = .003). A significant positive effect of delayed sports participation was found only for Grade 9 valuing of education (β = .15, SE = .05, p = .004). Finally, we found no effect of discontinued participation in sports relative to no participation.

Turning to performance arts/clubs, continuous participation had a significant positive effect on Grade 9 competence belief (β = .17, SE = .03, p < .001), teacher-rated classroom engagement (β = .21, SE = .05, p < .001), and teacher-awarded letter grades (β = .16, SE = .04, p < .001). Results of delayed performance arts/clubs’ participation parallel those for continuous participation, with effects found for Grade 9 competence belief (β = .10, SE = .04, p = .019), teacher-rated classroom engagement (β = .10, SE = .04, p = .020), and teacher-awarded letter grades (β = .06, SE = .03, p = .020). A significant positive effect was found for discontinued participation in performance arts/clubs relative to no participation in performance arts/clubs on academic competence beliefs only (β = .09, SE = .04, p = .040).

Gender and Ethnic Moderation of Effect of Duration Patterns

Using multiple group analysis, in separate analyses we tested the potential gender and ethnic moderating effects in the relation between the pattern of duration of participation and each Grade 9 outcome. We first allowed the relations between each pattern of participation and outcomes to vary across student gender and ethnicity (i.e., relaxed model) and then imposed equality constraints on these relations (i.e., constrained model), sequentially. We compared the two competing nested models (i.e., relaxed vs. constrained) at the significance of α ≤ .05 using Wald tests. The null hypothesis of the Wald test is that the constrained model (indicating no moderation effect) fits the data equally well as the relaxed model (indicating the existence of moderation effect). We tested all possible comparisons between groups (i.e., male vs. female for testing gender moderation; Euro-American vs. Latino; Euro-American vs. African American; Latino vs. African American for testing ethnicity moderation) on each outcome in two activity domains. Additional details on the results of Wald tests for testing gender and ethnicity moderation effect of duration patterns of participation on each of grade 9 outcomes are available from the corresponding author.

Gender moderation

According to Wald tests (with degrees of freedom of one for all Wald tests), one significant gender moderation effect in sport (χ2 = 5.68, p = .017 for valuing of education) of the 12 tests and two significant gender moderation effects in performance arts/clubs (for teacher-rated classroom engagement, χ2 = 12.10, p < .001; for teacher-awarded letter grade, χ2 = 3.97, p = .046) of the 12 tests were found. Specifically, in sports, the effect of discontinued participation on valuing of education was positively significant only for girls (β = .16, SE = .08, p = .040). In performance arts/clubs, for teacher-rated classroom engagement, the effect of discontinued participation was positively significant only for boys (β = .12, SE = .03, p < .001). For teacher-awarded letter grades, the effect of delayed participation was positively significant only for boys (β = .18, SE = .07, p = .007).

Ethnic moderation

For ethnic moderation analyses, we tested 36 pairwise comparisons (4 outcomes × 3 pairwise among three ethnic groups × 3 duration patterns) in each activity domain. Based on Wald tests for testing ethnic moderation effect, one significant effect in sport (for teacher-awarded letter grades χ2 = 10.76, p = .001) of the 36 tests and eight significant effects in performance arts/clubs (for simple presentation, these results of Wald tests were not reported here) of the 36 tests were found.

Turning to performance arts/clubs, for competence belief, the effect of discontinued participation was positively significant for Latino students (β = .14, SE = .06, p = .018) and African American students (β = .326, SE = .045, p < .001) while the effect of discontinued participation was negatively significant for Euro-American students (β = −.12, SE = .05, p = .017). For valuing of education, the effect of continuous participation was positive and significant only for Latino students (β = .10, SE = .03, p = .001) whereas the effect of discontinued participation was negative and significant only for Euro-American students (β = −.15, SE = .05, p = .004). For teacher-rated classroom engagement, the effect of discontinued participation was positive and significant only for African American students (β = .16, SE = .06, p = .009), whereas the effect of delayed participation was positively significant only for Latino students (β = .22, SE = .09, p = .011).

Discussion

The present study is the first to employ the weighted propensity score analyses to control for students’ probability of participating in school-sponsored extracurricular activities. Given the frequent caveat that individual, family, and school characteristics associated with participation profiles may account for observed associations between participation and outcomes, it is surprising that propensity score analyses has not previously been used in this body of research. When propensity scores are calculated on a large number of variables associated with the predictor and the outcome, as the case in the present study, propensity score analyses employing weights or matching closely mimic the results of an experimental study (West et al., 2014). Although we cannot definitively rule out the possibility that preexisting differences on some unmeasured variable potentially accounts for the results, this possibility is greatly reduced given the breadth of the baseline assessment and the balance achieved on the covariates across participation categories. The present study also controlled for students’ baseline scores on each outcome measure, thereby substantially increasing the internal validity of the effects detected in this study. Thus, results provide strong support for the conclusion that participation in school-sponsored sports and performance arts or clubs in middle school has a positive impact on students’ academic motivation and achievement at the transition to high school. Furthermore, the broad activity domain (sports or performance arts/clubs) and duration of participation are differentially predictive of academic outcomes.

Activity Domain

Sports participation predicted competence beliefs and educational value, whereas participation in performance arts/clubs predicted competence beliefs, teacher-rated classroom engagement, and teacher-awarded grades. The finding that both activity domains predicted an increase in academic competence beliefs suggests that extracurricular activities provide a context in which students can meet and overcome challenges and increase one’s skill level, thereby building confidence. The finding that performance arts/clubs but not sports predicts achievement is consistent with prior research and with the proposition that the social context for band and academic clubs provides greater reinforcement for academic achievement than is the case for sports (Denault & Poulin, 2009a; Fredricks & Eccles, 2008). Importantly, the current study’s methodology provides a stronger basis for concluding that the association between activity context and achievement is due to differences in participation context rather than differences in student and family characteristics associated with selection into different contexts. Notably, we calculated two propensity scores based on the two broad activity domains (i.e., the propensity to participate in sports and the propensity to participate in performance arts/clubs). The decision to create separate propensity scores was based on prior research finding differences in characteristics associated with participation in sports and non-sports (Feldman & Matjasko, 2007). For example, in a study of Canadian youth, Denault and Poulin (2009b) reported that number of problem behaviors at Grade 6 was positively associated with sports participation but not with performance arts/clubs at Grade 7. Of interest, in the current study, the correlation between propensity scores for sports participation and propensity scores for performance arts/clubs was not statistically significant (r = −.07). That is, students who select participation in sports and students who select participation in performance arts/clubs differ on a range of student and family characteristics prior to participation. Failure to take these differences into account may lead to erroneous conclusions regarding differential benefits associated with different types of activities.

Duration of Participation

Turning to patterns of participation, although continuous participation in an activity domain was most consistently associated with benefits, students who began participation in an activity domain in Grade 8 (delayed pattern) accrued nearly as many benefits as did students who began participation in Grade 7 and continued in Grade 8. Conversely, with the exception of competence beliefs for performance arts/clubs, students who began a participation domain in Grade 7 but quit in Grade 8 did not differ from nonparticipants on Grade 9 outcomes. Thus, the number of years of participation is less important than the pattern of years (i.e., delayed pattern was more helpful than discontinued pattern even though each pattern involves one year of participation). Unfortunately, the present study does not have information on the reasons students discontinued participation. Students who discontinue may have had negative experiences in the activity or may have not had the opportunity to participate due to participation requirements such as grades or tryout performance.

Gender

As expected, girls and boys are equally likely to participate in extracurricular activities, but boys are more likely to select sports participation than girls, and girls are more likely than boys to select performance arts/clubs. Benefits of continuous participation in each activity domain were similar for girls and boys. Gender moderated the effect of three noncontinuous participation patterns. Because we proffered no hypotheses regarding gender moderation and ran 12 tests for each activity domain (for a total of 24 tests), these three significant effects may be due to chance and should be interpreted with considerable caution. Further complicating interpretation of gender moderation of noncontinuous patterns of participation is a lack of consideration in these analyses for more complex patterns of participation, including switching from one domain to another.

Ethnicity

Consistent with prior research, Latino students in our sample had a lower rate of participation in extracurricular activities than Euro-American or African American youth. African American students were less likely than Euro-American youth to participate in performance arts/clubs but did not differ from Euro-American youth in sports participation. The lower rate of participation among Latino students in extracurricular activities may be due to a number of factors, including (a) less parental understanding of the academic benefits of participation and a corresponding lack of support for participation; (b) the value of obligation to the family within the Latino culture, which may lead students to work or take care of younger siblings instead of participating in what may be viewed as a social activity; and (c) practical constraints such as transportation and expenses associated with participation (Garner, 2013).

We expected that extracurricular participation would be more beneficial for Latino than for Euro-American or African American youth. Limited support for this hypothesis was found.

Specifically, in the domain of performance arts/clubs, discontinued participation in performance arts/clubs predicted higher competence beliefs for Latino and African American youth but lower competence beliefs for Euro-American youth. Delayed participation positively predicted teacher-rated engagement only for Latino youth. Finally, continuous participation predicted higher valuing of education for Latinos and lower valuing of education for Euro-Americans. In summary, Latino students are least likely to participate in extracurricular activities but as likely as or more likely than other ethnic groups to benefit from participation. Extracurricular activities are key social groups with which adolescents identify (Simpkins et al., 2011). Furthermore, consistent with social identity complexity theory, such participation predicts greater cross-ethnic friendships and more positive intergroup attitudes (Knifsend & Juvenon, 2014). The present study suggests that Latino students are deprived of participation opportunities, which likely contributes to low social integration at school and a lower sense of school belonging, both strong predictors of school engagement and completion of high school (Janosz et al., 2008).

Study Limitations and Future Directions

Results need to be interpreted in the context of study limitations. First, because participants in the study were selected on the basis of academic risk when they entered first grade, results may not generalize to samples entering school with above average literacy skills. The sample is also predominantly low SES. Because low SES and below average literacy skills in first grade predict subsequent academic failure, including dropping out of school, the current sample is an important one for understanding the role of extracurricular participation in reducing academic failure and improving low educational attainment.

Second, the investigation of ethnic differences in benefits associated with extracurricular participation is hindered by failure to take into account the heterogeneity that exists within each ethnic group. Previous studies have identified important differences within Latino groups associated with extracurricular participation, including generational status, language spoken in home, cultural orientation or acculturation, and SES (Peguero, 2010; Simpkins et al., 2011). School-level factors, such as the ethnic composition of the school, may also moderate the effect of extracurricular participation (masked). Future studies conducted within Latino samples are necessary to clarify which Latino youth are most likely to benefit from extracurricular participation, in what school and activity contexts.

Third, our categorization of activities as sports or performance arts/clubs does not capture variations in the transactions occurring within specific sports (e.g., football vs. tennis) or performance arts/clubs (e.g., band vs. student council). As observed by Guest and McRee (2008), the links between activity contexts and adjustment are likely explained by social factors such as relationships, identities, and norms within specific activity settings more so than the content of an activity itself. Unfortunately, the present study is not capable of identifying those transactions occurring in activity contexts that may account for observed benefits.

Fourth, our category of discontinued participation (i.e., participating in a particular activity domain in Grade 7 and not continuing in that activity domain in Grade 8) does not distinguish between students who switched activity domains and students who were not involved in any activity domain in Grade 8. Approximately 20% of students in the discontinued groups switched activity domains. Future studies with larger, multiethnic samples are needed to distinguish between students who discontinue one activity domain but continue to be involved in another activity domain.

Fifth, budget limitations allowed us to assess teacher ratings from only one teacher, typically the language arts teacher. Aggregation of ratings from multiple teachers of subject matter courses common to all students in these grades would enhance the reliability of the teacher ratings.

Implications for Policy and Practice

Despite study limitations, the “big picture” is clear: Extracurricular participation in Grades 7 and 8 or only in Grade 8 in middle school promotes academic motivation and achievement for at-risk youth. Furthermore, these benefits are generally similar for boys and girls and for members of different ethnic groups. Because the current sample is predominantly low SES and ethnically diverse and entered first grade with below average literacy skills, study findings suggest that policies and practices that increase extracurricular participation during the critical middle school years are likely to improve school success for students at risk for poor educational attainment. Schools differ in a number of ways that may expand or limit opportunities for participation, including the number of activities offered, the financial costs to students associated with participation, academic requirements for eligibility to participate, and the level of competition for inclusion. It is important for schools and families to view participation as an educational asset rather than an expendable option, thereby increasing opportunities for participation by all students.

The finding of lower participation among Latino youth is of considerable concern given the importance of participation to improving school engagement and school completion among all ethnic groups (Donegan, 2008). Although Latinos were less likely to participate in extracurricular activities than other ethnicities, participation had an equal or, in some cases, larger impact on Latino youths’ academic competence beliefs, valuing of education, teacher-rated engagement, and letter grades. Results of a qualitative study (Garner, 2013) of middle school Latino students suggested that family obligations such as working to help with family finances and caring for younger children, lack of parent understanding of the academic benefits of extracurricular activities and a corresponding lack of support for participation, and practical constraints such as transportation and expenses serve as barriers to participation. Studies have found that parent encouragement of participation is particularly important to Latino students’ decisions to participate in extracurricular activities (Dunn, Kinney, & Hofferth, 2003;Shannon, 2006). Thus, specific outreach to Latino students and their parents, emphasizing the connection between participation and school success, and remedies to lessen practical constraints such as transportation may increase participation among this segment of the population. Given the heterogeneity within the Latino group on variables that may affect participation, including immigrant generational status and English language proficiency (Peguero, 2010), schools are advised to employ focus groups and surveys to gain a better understanding of factors that influence participation in their particular community. For example, there may be particular activities, such as soccer, that are not available at a particular school but that, if offered, might be an attractive option for Latino students in that school community.

Conclusion

Using propensity score analyses to remove selection bias, the study found that participation in extracurricular activities in middle school promotes positive school identities, behavioral engagement in the classroom, and letter grades at Grade 9, above students’ performance on the same or similar measures administered at Grade 5. Participation in sports and performance arts/clubs are associated with different outcomes; consequently, students who participate in both sports and performance arts/clubs likely experience the broadest benefits. Students who begin an activity context in Grade 8 gain benefits comparable to students who begin an activity in Grade 7 and continue into Grade 8. Positive school identities, behavioral engagement in classroom, and course grades at the beginning of high school are highly predictive of ultimate success in completing high school (Donegan, 2008; Janosz et al., 2008;Legault, Green-Demers, & Pelletier, 2006). Given the at-risk nature of the sample, findings suggest the potential impact of extracurricular participation in middle school on reducing dropout rates and ethnic and income disparities in educational attainment.

Appendix

  • This research was funded by grant HD 039367 from the National Institute for Child Health and Human Development awarded to Jan N. Hughes.

  • Received March 10, 2015.
  • Revision received June 8, 2016.
  • Accepted July 30, 2016.

MYUNG HEE IM, PhD, is a researcher at the American Institute for Research, 1000 Thomas J. Jefferson Street NW, Washington, DC 2007; e-mail:myunghee.im@gmail.com . Her research interests include measurement invariance and latent growth analysis under multilevel modeling and structural equation modeling. She has conducted large-scale longitudinal data analyses to investigate the impact of grade retention on students’ academic achievement and engagement.

JAN N. HUGHES, PhD, is professor emerita at Texas A&M University. Her research interests include peer relationships, teacher-student relationships, social and emotional development, and academic achievement. She has conducted large-scale longitudinal studies to investigate risk and protective processes in children and adolescents.

QIAN CAO is a doctoral student in the Research, Measurement, and Statistics Program in the Department of Educational Psychology at Texas A&M University. She holds the position of graduate research assistant. Her research interests include longitudinal data analyses, structural equation modeling, and measurement invariance.

OI-MAN KWOK, PhD, holds the position of professor in the Department of Educational Psychology at Texas A&M University and teaches in the Learning Sciences Program. His research interests include structural equation modeling and longitudinal data analysis.

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Communications with Key Citizens and More

Communications with Key Citizens and More

Screen Shot 2016-08-12 at 10.28.20 AMKey Communicators are people who are active in the community. They have many connections in the community, speak often to various people in the community who are trusted and widely regarded for their leadership and input. Key Communicators might be local business owners, retirees, parents, or community members. They are sincere dedicated people who want to be involved and care about our schools.  The concept of key communicators, I believe, was developed by Dr. Rich Bagin, Executive Director of the National School Public Relations Association.

The NSBA Tip Sheet on Key Communicators

People talk to people … those people talk to other people. And that is how a lot of school news gets around. One problem is that this communication system is unreliable and usually one-way. Bits of information filter outward from the schools into the community along informal channels without accuracy or completeness. Thus, rumors form, spread, and become difficult to counteract. When the misinformation filters back to school officials, it is often too late for a meaningful response, and sparks that could have been quickly snuffed out become major fires. School board members and administrators from every school district can cite examples in which rapidly spreading rumors caused misunderstandings to multiply. In these cases, crises that could have been headed off happened so quickly that the usual newsletters and news releases were useless.

What? To control this grapevine system of communications, set up an active key communicator network. Essentially, a key communicator network is a group of opinion leaders who establish solid two-way communications among organizations and their publics. These opinion leaders talk to lots of people who tend to listen to what they have to say. Key communicators agree to disseminate accurate information and correct misinformation about the school system. They keep in touch with school officials and immediately report misperceptions and inaccuracies.

A key communicator network allows a school district to get accurate news out to the staff and community quickly. It enables school officials to intercept potentially harmful rumors. And it costs very little to set up and maintain.

Why? Research shows that people believe their friends and neighbors more than they believe the media. Marketing research supports this view, revealing that people make major purchases based on what others tell them about a product or a service. It is reasonable to assume that people make decisions about schools the same way. Thus, school officials must spend time cultivating relationships with key employees and community members and keeping them informed if they want to gain understanding and acceptance of their school programs. Studies have found that mass communication generally does not change minds but only reinforces existing positions, activating opposition as well as support. One-on-one communication, on the other hand, is quiet and speaks directly to the target audiences. The aim of key communicators is to build support, deflecting any effects of criticism. The media rarely launch crusades; they usually report the ideas of others. A well-organized, campaign targeting opinion leaders discourages attacks by going straight to the people who bring issues to the media.

Benefits of a Key Communicator Network Being person-to-person in nature, the program enables school officials to establish two-way communication and get a quick pulse of the community. The program helps to bridge the distance between school officials and the community – the community gets to know school officials as people, not distant figureheads. Regular communications to key opinion leaders offers more opportunities to convey the many successes of positive accomplishments in the schools. A major benefit of the program is rumor control or a controlled grapevine whereby volatile issues or confrontations are quickly communicated to these opinion leaders. Communicating negative news or problems to this group also establishes candor and openness and ultimately will establish credibility between school officials and the citizenry.

Who? Key communicators are adults and students who have credibility in the community. They may or may not be in positions of authority or officially recognized leaders.  They may be barbers, beauticians, or bartenders. They often are dentists, gas station owners, firefighters, post office clerks, and news agency owners. Within a school, they are often secretaries or custodians. In one way or another, however, these opinion leaders have an interest in their community schools. Interestingly, opinion leaders who make up a successful key communicator network are seldom the loudmouths who complain at every school board meeting. More likely, they are the people who only speak when they feel it is important and when they have a valid statement to make. They are the people others ask

“What do you think about … ?” Key communicators should represent the different demographic segments of the community as well as the various segments of the school district staff. Having good two-way communication in place internally is extremely important. Employees resent hearing school information first from community residents. Key communicators are everywhere, but even though they are highly influential, they may not be highly visible. Their distinguishing characteristics are that they are well-respected and people trust their opinions. Critics should definitely be invited. In a group of 10 people, one or two critics usually add credibility to the undertaking. Experience has shown that after involvement in a key communicator process, critics frequently become supporters.

Where? The work of key communicators is carried out in churches, homes, businesses, organization meetings, clubs, or schools. Only one meeting of all the key communicators is usually necessary, and it should be brief and to the point. Much of the two-way communication between a key communicator and school officials is by phone, brief mailings, or in person. To better communicate with your key communicator network, you may want to set up a telephone system to record 30-second messages relaying the facts of the situation and telling callers to dial another number for more information. If a crisis develops in one school, the system allows calls to the key communicators serving that school. When? A good time to start a key communicator network is in the fall. While key communicators are most helpful in a time of trouble or turmoil, you need to establish mutual trust and credibility before you can depend on them to call you when they hear a rumor or to set someone straight who’s spreading misinformation. Once key communicators are identified, it is critical to communicate with them regularly on a personal, one-to-one basis. Their phone calls to school officials should be returned immediately, and their requests for information answered promptly. If you expect them to share good news about the schools, they must have that information in a timely and understandable fashion.

If Coaching Is So Powerful, Why Aren’t Principals Being Coached?

Leadership Coaching.jpg

In most instructional coaching philosophies the teacher wants to be coached. Instructional coaching expert Jim Knight, someone I work with as an instructional coaching trainer, says that teachers should be the ones to choose to enroll with the coach. Additionally to that, those teachers should be able to choose the goal they want to work on. This initial aspect to the coaching cycle takes a lot of dialogue to get to the heart of why the goal is the best goal for them.

In those cases where a teacher doesn’t know what goal to choose but wants to do a full instructional coaching cycle, the teacher and coach co-construct the goals together. This may take a baseline observation or a teacher videotaping themselves to look at whether their engagement is authentic or compliant.

According to Knight’s research, coaching is an effective way to provide individualized professional development to teachers because those teachers who choose to be a part of the coaching program are an eager participant in the process. Coaching will help teachers retain up to 90% of what they learned, as opposed to losing 90% when they go to the typical sit-and-get professional development. Knight’s research certainly fits into the research of others who have studied professional development.

For example, Timperley et al (2007) found that the most effective professional development had the following elements.

  • Over a long period of time (three to five years)
  • Involves external experts
  • Teachers are deeply engaged
  • It challenges teachers’ existing beliefs
  • Teachers talk to each other about teaching
  • School leadership supports teachers’ opportunities to learn and provides opportunities within the school structure for this to happen

Leadership support can happen in different ways. In the best case scenario involving school leadership and teachers, a principal would suggest coaching as a way to help any teacher improve. That means teachers who may have a low level of self-efficacy (Bandura) and need assistance or a teacher who is a high flyer and can benefit from a keen eye and effective feedback.

What about principals?
If principals believe that teachers can benefit from high quality coaching, doesn’t that mean that principals can as well? I wonder how many would engage in that type of professional development? Many times the school leader believes that they are supposed to know it all, which is quite possibly why they moved to the principalship. And some principals may believe coaching is for teaching and not for them, which is an interesting dilemma when it comes to who values coaching and why. If coaches are good for teachers, shouldn’t coaching be valuable for leaders too?

There are leaders who believe that coaching can be just as important for them as it is for teachers. This is the collaborative, growth and innovative mindset leaders should have. If leaders truly believe in being collaborative, they also understand that they have a blind spot (Scharmer) which they lead from on a daily basis, and they may need outside guidance on how to get through that blind spot. For example, a possible blind spot is that they may enter into a situation with a confirmation bias that prevents them from seeing what is really happening in the classroom.

Let’s use this scenario:

A principal may enter into a classroom of a teacher that they don’t necessarily believe is a strong teacher and look for the reasons to support their bias. A coach could help principals understand that they have a bias because that coach is entering without the same confirmation bias.

Additionally, leadership coaches may help leaders understand how they can communicate better with staff, students and parents. They can even help leaders understand how to build collective teacher efficacy, which John Hattie, someone I work with as a Visible Learning trainer, has found to have an effect size of 1.57.

Practice What We Preach?
Coaching can be very beneficial. I’ve seen the benefits more now than I ever did as a principal because I have had the luxury to work with highly effective coaches around the country. They don’t want the position for status or power, but they do want to coach because they have a goal of helping their peers (build collective efficacy) at the same time they learn from those peers they work with.

The same can be done at the leadership level. Building synergy among leaders and getting them to try new strategies to build collective efficacy among their staff is something coaches can help do, and they often offer an outside perspective because they have worked with many other leaders.

We know from Knight’s research and the research of others including Timperley that professional development, and that’s what coaching is, is a lot stronger when both parties want to be a part of it. If coaching is beneficial to teachers, we can make it better for leaders as well. We just have to have the proper collaborative, growth and innovative mindset to get there.

Please click here to take a short, anonymous 4 question survey on leadership coaching?

Peter DeWitt, Ed.D. is the author of several books including Collaborative Leadership: 6 Influences That Matter Most (September, 2016. Corwin Press) where he explains self-efficacy and how to build collective teacher efficacy. Connect with Peter on Twitter.

The Socio-affective Impact of Acceleration and Ability Grouping: Recommendations for Best Practice

by Maureen Neihart  in the The Gifted Child Quarterly51.4 (Fall 2007): 330-341.

Although the academic gains associated with acceleration and peer ability grouping are well documented, resistance to their use for gifted students continues because of concerns that such practices will cause social or emotional harm to students. Results from the broad research indicate that grade skipping, early school entrance, and early admission to college have socioaffective benefits for gifted students who are selected on the basis of demonstrated academic, social, and emotional maturity, but may be harmful to unselected students who are arbitrarily accelerated on the basis of IQ,
achievement, or social maturity.

There is little research on the socio-affective effects of peer ability grouping. The limited evidence indicates strong benefits for highly gifted students and possibly for some minority or disadvantaged gifted students. Robust evidence does not exist to support the idea that heterogeneous classroom grouping per se significantly increases the risk for adjustment problems among moderately gifted students. Recommendations for best practice based on the available evidence are presented.

Putting the Research to Use: What is the best educational placement for a gifted student? What grouping or acceleration options are most beneficial? Many of us grapple with these decisions every week. We sometimes hesitate to pursue certain programming options out of concern for the gifted child’s psychological adjustment. Decisions are often complicated by conflicting claims made about the social or emotional consequences of acceleration and peer ability grouping for gifted students, in particular. Analyzing and synthesizing a body of empirical research is one way to answer these questions and to recommend best practices. My hope is that the analysis and synthesis I offer here will provide some evidence-based guidance for these important decisions and that in the future, such decisions will be approached systematically on the basis of the best evidence. More importantly, I am optimistic that this synthesis will encourage educational leaders to reevaluate their school district policies and practices regarding acceleration and ability grouping and will strengthen their confidence to institute policies that reflect the best evidence. This synthesis helps to clarify what we do not know, as well as what we do know, about ways in which the consequences of acceleration and peer ability grouping vary in different contexts and raises pointed questions for future research

In spite of the well-documented academic benefits of Acceleration and peer ability grouping (Colangelo, Assouline, & Gross, 2004; Cornell, Callahan, Bassin, & Ramsay, 1991; Gagné & Gagnier, 2004; Gross, 1993, 2003; Kulik & Kulik, 1982, 1984, 1987, 1992; Lubinski, 2004; Lubinski, Webb, Morelock, & Benbow, 2001; Moon, Swift, & Shallenberger, 2002; Noble, Arndt, Nicholson, Sletten, & Zamora, 1999; Richardson & Benbow, 1990; Rogers, 2004; Southern & Jones, 1991; Swiatek & Benbow, 1991), there is ongoing resistance to increasing the use of either in many public schools. The reasons were given often have to do with concerns about the potential for social or emotional harm to students (Colangelo et al., 2004; Southern, Jones, & Fiscus, 1989). Parents express concern that acceleration will isolate their children or will be too stressful emotionally. Teachers and administrators hesitate over concerns about burnout and adjustment problems years down the road. What can we say in response? What do we know about the immediate and long-term socio-affective impact of acceleration on gifted students? Is there any research on the socio-affective impact of peer ability-grouping to guide us? What recommendations can we make for best practice?

Given that several comprehensive reviews of the research on acceleration and on peer ability grouping are available (Brody, Muratori, & Stanley, 2004; Cornell et al., 1991; Gross & van Vliet, 2005; Kulik & Kulik, 1982, 1984, 1992; Lubinski, 2004; Moon & Reis, 2004; Proctor, Black, & Feldhusen, 1986; Robinson, 2004; Rogers, 1992; Slavin, 1987; Southern & Jones, 1991), another review will not be offered here. Instead, the aim of this article is to pull from the research those findings that specifically address the socio-affective impact of acceleration and peer ability grouping and to make recommendations for best practice based on the evidence. The goal is to guide the practitioner in evidence-based decision making regarding the utilization of these two educational options for gifted students.

The Socioaffective Impact of Acceleration

Academic acceleration of high-ability youth is one of the most well-researched topics in education. The growing number of universities accepting younger students and the success of the talent search programs in identifying exceptional academic talent nationwide have made it easier to locate and assess accelerated students, resulting in an ever-growing body of research (Bower, 1990; Brody & Benbow, 1987; Gross, 1993, 2003; Heinbokel, 1997; Plucker & Taylor, 1998; Pollins, 1983; Prado & Scheibel, 1995; Richardson & Benbow, 1990; Swiatek & Benbow, 1991; Thomas, 1993). Although acceleration can take many forms, the three most commonly studied are the early entrance to the school, early entrance to college, and grade skipping. Studies of these forms of acceleration consistently fail to find evidence of any negative social or emotional effects for nearly all accelerants (Brody et al., 2004; Cornell et al., 1991; Gross, 1993, 2003; Gross & van Vliet, 2005; Robinson, 2004; Rogers, 1992), and numerous studies have identified social or emotional benefits. Table 1 lists the most common socio-affective benefits, along with samples of the empirical studies reporting them.

Although the majority of studies find that acceleration does no harm in either the short or long term, few studies find that it results in a socio-affective advantage for gifted students. In the most thorough analysis of the social and emotional effects of acceleration, Rogers (1992) reviewed 81 studies that investigated the social or emotional impact of acceleration and, using Slavin’s (1986, 1987) best-evidence synthesis technique, found positive effects in both social (mean effect size = 0.46) and emotional (mean effect size = 0.12) aspects. Social effects were typically examined via social maturity scores, teacher ratings of social skills, participation in extracurricular activities, and leadership positions held. Emotional effects typically referred to measures of self-concept or teacher or parent ratings of risk taking, independence, and creativity. Rogers (1992) noted significant emotional effects(effect size = .58) for subject-based acceleration in particular.

Several excellent longitudinal studies of accelerated gifted students have tracked the long-term effects of acceleration and found long-lasting social and emotional benefits (Gross, 1993, 2003; Lubinski, 2004; Lubinski et al., 2001). Among them, Gross’s (1993, 2003; Gross & van Vliet, 2005) study of 60 Australian children with an IQ of 160+ is noteworthy as the only comparison of children who were radically accelerated with those who were not. Of the 17 students in her study who were able to accelerate radically, there was not a single instance of harm or disadvantage as a result. In sharp contrast, however, was her finding that “the majority of children retained with age peers experienced significant and lasting difficulties in forming or maintaining friendships” (Gross & van Vliet, 2005, p. 159). Her study is unique in its demonstration that failure to accelerate was associated with significant adjustment problems.

Students who skip all or some of high school to enroll in college full time are the focus of a great many studies (Brody, Lupkowski, & Stanley, 1988; Brody & Stanley, 1991; Caplan, Henderson, Henderson, & Fleming, 2002; Ingersoll & Cornell, 1995; Janos et al., 1988; Janos, Sanfilippo, & Robinson, 1986; Lupkowski, Whitmore, & Ramsay, 1992; Muratori, Colangelo, & Assouline, 2003; Noble et al., 1999; Noble & Drummond, 1992; Olszweski-Kubilius, 1995; Robinson & Janos, 1986). These studies come to similar conclusions: Students who are carefully selected tend to do very well academically, socially, and emotionally. Early studies did observe negative social or emotional effects for some early entrants, but these were often ameliorated by a change in curriculum, a change in counseling support, or improved selection criteria.

Do any studies observe a negative socio-affective impact from acceleration? What about the common concerns that accelerated students will not fit in, that they will have problems making friends or be unhappy and have behavior problems? Among the hundreds of studies on acceleration, only three have observed negative emotional effects for accelerated children as a group. The negative effects noted are as follows: decline in academic self-concept (Marsh, Chessor, Craven, & Roche, 1995; Marsh & Hau, 2003; Zeidner & Schleyer, 1999), higher anxiety (Zeidner & Schleyer, 1999), and decline in grades (Zeidner & Schleyer, 1999).

Marsh and Hau’s (2003) ambitious, large-scale study of self-concept in a sample of more than 100,000 high school students in 26 countries from the Program of Student Assessment database for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development deserves mention for the controversy it has stirred up. The authors used multilevel modeling to analyze the relationship between self-concept, individual achievement, and school average achievement. They found that students in academically challenging programs had significantly lower self-concepts than did those in non-selective schools. Marsh and Hau argued persuasively that the observed decline in academic self-concept was a serious concern given that academic self-concept mediates educational aspirations, effort, motivation, and coursework selection.

Critics, however, warned that it is difficult to interpret these findings (Dai, 2004; Plucker et al., 2004). Is a higher academic self-concept and less anxiety necessarily better? What if it means that students have a distorted view of their competence? Plucker et al. (2004) reasoned

Is it possible that self-concepts are reduced but remain high (i.e., a modesty effect)? If so, we see the implications of this study quite differently. Indeed, recent research on competence suggests that people who are not skilled at something tend to think of themselves as being highly skilled, often underestimating the abilities of others (Dunning, Johnson, Ehrlinger, & Kruger, 2003). Sternberg (1999) has proposed that this lack of realistic self-assessment prevents success in highly competitive fields: One needs a realistic view of one’s abilities in order to capitalize on personal strengths and compensate for weaknesses. For these reasons, being in the company of like-minded peers with whom one can relate, converse, and argue is a critical component of intellectual and social development that this study does not address, (p. 269)

In spite of the consistent evidence of socio-affective benefits for accelerants as a group, it is important to note that negative effects are occasionally observed for individuals. Some accelerated gifted students do exhibit problems with conduct or mood. Two examples will illustrate.

Richardson and Benbow (1990) asked more than 2,000 junior high students who scored high on the Scholastic Achievement Test (SAT)-Math from 1972 to 1974 to complete questionnaires at ages 18 and 23. By age 18, more than one half the sample had accelerated their education. Richardson and Benbow found no differences between accelerants and nonaccelerants with respect to self-esteem, the locus of control, social interactions, identity, self-acceptance, or social and emotional problems. They also found no gender differences. At age 23, however, 3% of the respondents did view the acceleration as having a negative impact on their life.

Gagné and Gagnier (2004) asked 78 Canadian teachers, each with at least one early entrant in his or her classroom, to judge all of their students on four indicators of adjustment: interest in academic achievement, maturity toward school tasks (attention, concentration, and perseverance), social integration, and conduct. To minimize raters’ tendency to exaggerate positive ratings, the authors asked the teachers to choose the five most well-adjusted students in their class and rank them from 1 to 5 and then to choose the five least well-adjusted students and rank them from A to E. In their quantitative analysis, Gagné and Gagnier found no differences in adjustment between early entrants and regularly admitted students, but in their qualitative analysis they observed that teachers rated almost 30% of the early entrants as below average on two or more dimensions of adjustment.

We should conclude that the oft-cited concern that academic acceleration will cause social or emotional harm to gifted children is not supported in the empirical literature. There is no evidence that accelerated gifted students as a group will have problems making friends or getting along with others or that they will become overly stressed, depressed, or suicidal. However, there are documented cases of individual accelerated students having significant adjustment problems. We, therefore, cannot conclude that all gifted students should grade skip or enter kindergarten or enroll in college early.

Although research shows no substantial positive or negative socialization or psychological differences for grade skipping, early admission to college, or early entrance to kindergarten, we cannot make similar claims for other accelerative options, because they are not as well researched. It is impossible to draw solid conclusions about the social or emotional impact of Advanced Placement (AP) or honors classes, magnet schools, independent study, and curriculum compacting, for instance, because studies do not distinguish one form of acceleration from another and there is too much-uncontrolled variability in how students are selected for these options (Cornell et al., 1991). We can predict that gifted students who are carefully selected for accelerative options should not only experience academic benefits, but may also experience some social or emotional benefits as well and that there may be circumstances in which it is not the best option for certain individuals. Risks can possibly be minimized by using a tool like the IowaAcceleration Scale (Assouline, Colangelo, Lupkowski-Shoplik, & Lipscomb, 2003) to select candidates carefully.

Given that there is little evidence to support the idea that gifted children who are accelerated manifest better social and emotional adjustment than those who are not accelerated, primarily because few studies compared gifted accelerated children with those who did not accelerate (e.g., see Gross, 2003), we do not have sufficient evidence to make the claim that gifted children who are accelerated do better socially or emotionally than do gifted children who are not accelerated.

The Socioaffective Impact of Peer Ability Grouping

There is ample evidence in the literature that grouping students of high ability together benefits their achievement (Brody & Benbow, 1987; Brody & Stanley, 1991; Gamoran & Berends, 1987; Isaacs & Duffus, 1995; Janos & Robinson, 1985; Kolloff, 1989; Kulik & Kulik, 1982, 1984, 1987, 1990; Louetal., 1996; Rogers, 1992, 1993, 2004; Slavin, 1990; Southern & Jones, 1991; Starko, 1988; Vaughn, Feldhusen, & Asher, 1991), but few have examined its socioaffective impact (AdamsByers, Whitsell, & Moon, 2004; Gross, 1993, 2003; Gross & van Vliet, 2005; Kulik & Kulik, 1982, 1987; Marsh et al., 1995; Marsh & Hau, 2003; Moon, Swift, & Shallenberger, 2002; Shields, 1995; Zentall, Moon, Hall, & Grskovic, 2001). How clear is it that such grouping provides social or emotional benefits? Is there empirical evidence that failure to group students by ability harms some gifted students? What socioaffective impact, if any, doesability grouping have?

The literature on the socioaffective effects of peer ability grouping is not nearly as extensive as it is on acceleration, and thedebate about ability grouping is often confounded by mixing of terms. Peer grouping is defined in the literature as any arrangement that attempts to place students with similar levels of ability in instructional groups. The most common form is between-class abilitygrouping in secondary schools, but forms of within-class ability grouping are also seen, especially at the primary level, wherestudents are often grouped by ability within class for reading and, less often, math. Tracking (or streaming, as it is called in Europe) is a hotly debated but pervasive form of ability grouping in secondary schools in which students are assigned on the basis of ability to a series of classes. Most commonly these include a college-prep track, a vocational track, and a special education track. Tracking is a full-scale, permanent grouping of students by ability, as measured by test scores or grades. Ability grouping includes tracking, but not all ability grouping is tracking.

The overall conclusion is that various forms of ability grouping have differential effects for gifted students. Peer ability grouping seems to have positive socio-affective effects for some gifted students, neutral effects for others, and detrimental effects on a few. Table 2 lists the socio-affective benefits associated with peer ability grouping along with the studies reporting the benefits.

Among the studies that examined the impact of ability grouping on self-concept, some reported a decline in self-concept (Gross, 2003; Kulik & Kulik, 1984; Shields, 1995), others reported again (McQuilkin, 1981), and some reported no change (Maddux, Scheicher, & Bass 1982; Vaughn et al., 1991). Even within studies, differential effects on self-concept are observed. For instance, Rogers’ (1992) best-evidence synthesis found differential effects on self-esteem for different grouping arrangements: small gains for nongraded classrooms and early entrance to college, small losses for subject acceleration, and no differences for AP.

Although some authors view a decline in self-concept as a serious concern (see, e.g., Marsh & Hau, 2003), others perceive the decline as simply an adjustment to a more realistic perception of one’s abilities (see, e.g., Plucker et al., 2004; Rogers, 2004) or a reflection of a new realization of the discrepancy between their ability and their achievement (Gross, 2003).

Studies that use student self-report measures to explore the socio-affective impact of ability grouping also report mixed findings. For instance, in their survey of gifted students’ perceptions of homogeneously and heterogeneously grouped classrooms, Adams-Byers et al. (2004) reported that their 44 subjects “perceived mixed-ability grouping to offer the greatest number of social/emotional advantages and high-ability grouping to offer the greatest number of academic advantages” (p. 10). However, 54% of the self-reported disadvantages of ability grouping were related to a decrease in achievement status due to the greater competition in such classrooms.

In another example, Shields (1995) used a questionnaire to assess the attitudes and perceptions of fifth- and eighth-grade gifted students in homogeneous and heterogeneous classrooms and came up with some unexpected results. First, both fifth- and eighth grade students in homogeneous classrooms reported more development of their career interests. Eighth grade students in heterogeneous classrooms demonstrated greater academic self-concept than those in homogeneous classrooms. No significant differences were noted in perceptions of autonomy, independent development, peer relations, enjoyment of school, or involvement in school activities.

A study noteworthy for its finding that heterogeneous grouping may have deleterious social and emotional effects on high-ability students is Farmer and Farmer’s (1996) comparison of social affiliations. They studied patterns of social affiliations in third- and fourth-grade gifted students, students with learning disabilities, and students with emotional or behavioral disorders in mixed-ability classrooms. They observed that students tended to form affiliations within only one cluster and that these affiliations were based on shared social or personal characteristics.

“[B]oys receiving AG [academically gifted] services seemed to thrive when there were enough of them in a classroom to allow them to form a core prosocial group. In the absence of this critical mass, though, the social positioning of boys with AG services was not nearly as positive” (p. 447).

The authors observed that gifted boys, in particular, tended to rely on antisocial behaviors and affiliations to gain a central social position in the classroom when the classroom lacked a “critical mass” of gifted boys.

The socio-affective impact of ability grouping is further illuminated by a few studies that investigated the academic and personal adjustment of talented minority students (Diaz, 1998; Fordham & Ogbu, 1986; Hebert, 1996, 2001; Isaacs & Duffus, 1995; Jones, 2003; Kuriloff & Reichert, 2003). These studies stressed the contribution of peer support networks to persistence with challenging curriculum and successfully transitioning to challenging postsecondary options. They provide limited empirical support that ability grouping facilitates satisfactory peer relationships that may be crucial to keeping students who face barriers to high achievement-like language, social isolation, and discrimination engaged in challenging coursework and in keeping motivation and aspirations high.

However, differential results are observed among them as well. For instance, Kuriloff and Reichert’s (2003) qualitative study of 27 high school boys in an elite prep school observed that talented Black students who formed a cohesive peer group were able to better negotiate the social geography of the school. Kuriloff and Reichert postulated that being surrounded by peers who were also thinking of going to college, who were also struggling with crossing economic, cultural, or racial borders, and with whom students could share strategies for negotiating the unique social terrain of the school may have reduced the attrition of talented minority students from challenging coursework. In contrast, Jones (2003) concluded in her study of 10 talented women from working-class backgrounds that participation in advanced classes sometimes intensified the experience of marginality and visibility experienced by working class, minority gifted students because in such classes they developed greater awareness of advantage and disadvantage, privilege and injustice, at an earlier age. The apparent contradiction between Jones’s findings and those of Kuriloff and Reichert may be due to the opportunities students had in their peer groups to discuss the affiliation conflicts they felt. It is not clear from Jones’s study whether her subjects had the opportunity to discuss or externalize the conflicts they experienced. It may be that for gifted minority students, peer grouping itself is not as important as having regular opportunities to explore the conflicts they feel regarding affiliation and achievement.

In contrast to those studies that report social or psychological benefits, several studies observed negative socio-affective effects of ability grouping (Adams-Byers et al., 2004; Marsh et al., 1995; Marsh & Hau, 2003; Zeidner & Schleyer, 1999; Zentall et al., 2001). The most common finding is a significant drop in self-concept among high-ability students who are homogeneously grouped, but Zeidner and Schleyer (1999) also observed higher levels of anxiety in homogeneously grouped children.

Highlighting the complexity of the variables involved is a study by Zentall et al. (2001). They conducted the only empirical study examining the socio-affective adjustment of accelerated gifted students with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD) in a self-contained classroom. They compared gifted AD/HD students in a self-contained accelerated classroom with gifted peers without AD/HD in the same classroom and average AD/HD students in a regular classroom and found that though the gifted AD/HD students did well academically, they had trouble with social relations. Zentall et al. concluded that “gifted students with AD/HD may be at risk for problems with social/emotional development if they are accelerated with their GT peers without further accommodations for their AD/HD disability” (as cited in Moon & Reis, 2004, p. 114).

Adding to our understanding of the socio-affective impact of ability grouping on gifted students are the results of two studies that observed a negative impact in mixed-ability classrooms. Gross (1989) observed social rejection and alienation, and Baker, Bridger, and Evans (1999) reported decreased motivation and disinterest in school.

Rogers (1993) aptly concludes:

What seems evident about the spotty research on socialization and psychological effects when grouping by ability is that no pattern of improvement or decline can be established. It is likely that there are many personal, environmental, family, and other extraneous variables that affect self-esteem and socialization more directly than the practice of grouping itself, (p. 10)

Best Practice Recommendations

Given the findings from the research and the limitations of the studies, what best practice recommendations can we make for acceleration and ability grouping in terms of the social and emotional benefits? Regarding acceleration, we can say the following:

* Acceleration should be routine for highly gifted children. All highly gifted children should be evaluated for grade skipping, in particular.

* Acceleration options should be available for capable students. No school district or school administrator should have a policy that prohibits accelerative options for students, including grade skipping.

* All school districts should have written policies or procedures in place to ensure that acceleration options (e.g., grade skipping, early entrance to kindergarten, and early admission to college) are available in all schools and to guide parents and teachers in the steps to follow for referral and evaluation of students.

* Students who are being considered for acceleration should be screened for social readiness, emotional maturity, and motivation for acceleration. A tool, such as The Iowa Acceleration Scale (Assouline et al., 2003), may help to select candidates for acceleration.

* When possible, students who are grade skipping or making an early entrance to college should do so as part of a cohort. There appear to be benefits to cohort acceleration that are more difficult to replicate when students go it alone.

* Young students considering early college entrance should begin taking one or more college-level classes to gain experience with the social, cognitive, and academic expectations of such classes before attending college full time.

* Similarly, candidates for early entrance to kindergarten should ideally have some experience with preschool before enrolling in kindergarten.

* In selecting candidates for acceleration, educators should consider the possibility that a student who demonstrates low motivation, social withdrawal or isolation, and negative attitudes toward school or academic work might, in fact, be a good candidate for acceleration options.

* All gifted students are not good candidates for grade skipping, early entrance to kindergarten, or early admission to college.

Given that few studies examined peer ability grouping for socialization or psychological effects, what recommendations can we make regarding peer ability grouping? We can suggest the following:

* The menu of grouping arrangements available to gifted students should be expanded so that we meet the diverse needs of this population. Ask “What grouping options do we currently not offer?” and strive to make it available.

* Although peer ability grouping is associated with strong achievement benefits, it appears to pose social or emotional challenges for some gifted children. Do not promote it as the panacea for all.

* It should be recognized that twice-exceptional children may face significant difficulties with social adjustment when ability grouped if accommodations are not made for their disabilities.

* One should keep in mind that students’ preference for mixed-ability grouping arrangements may be reflective of their desire to maintain their perceived achievement status, rather than an indication of any real difficulties with peer relations.

* Staff development should be made the highest priority so that every mixed-ability classroom has a teacher who can deliver accelerated instruction to high-ability students. It is well established that both academic and socio-affective gains are associated with the advanced instruction for gifted students.

We should also stress that any discussion about ability grouping must address the valid concern that grouping in the past has been associated with inequality of opportunity (Oakes, 1985; Pool & Page, 1995; Rosenbaum, 1980). Ability grouping has historically discriminated on the basis of class (Hochschild & Scovronick, 2003). Affluent children are three times as likely as disadvantaged children to be placed in high-ability groups, and even though scores of ability or achievement are the primary determinants of such placements, class-based factors come in second (Dauber, 1996; Hochschild & Scovronick, 2003). Peer ability grouping is also often viewed as a race issue, because accelerated or high-ability classes have traditionally been dominated by affluent White children, whereas lower ability classes and special education programs have been dominated by children of color from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. These are important issues that are not easily resolved. Indeed, they are the basis for some authorities’ insistence that the only satisfactory option for all children is placement in heterogeneous classrooms with differentiated instruction, even though research demonstrates that this option does not meet the needs of some children (Gamoran & Mare, 1989; Oakes, 1985).

Proponents of peer ability grouping for gifted children typically emphasize that they are not advocating for tracking, per se, but for flexible ability grouping. However, the reality is often not congruent with rhetoric, and in practice, peer ability grouping effectively becomes tracking in many schools in the United States, especially at the high school level. Our common neglect of this valid concern perpetuates the sometimes adversarial and vitriolic debates about the benefits of homogeneous grouping for high ability students. Given that peer grouping is about separation and divisions, any kind of ability grouping is anathema to those who believe that inclusion is the only way to guarantee equity. Within-class groups must be very flexible and provide opportunities for all students to change groups according to their abilities on specific skills. We must be prepared not only to address these concerns but also to work to ensure fair allocation of resources and quality instruction for all children.

Limitations of the Research

The body of literature on the social and emotional effects of acceleration and ability grouping has four serious limitations. The first is that most of it is descriptive or correlational by design. Well-controlled, randomized design studies are simply not undertaken for obvious reasons, so findings are always based on samples or methodologies that are flawed in some way.

A serious second limitation is that most studies rely on subjective perceptions of adjustment by students, parents, or teachers, rather than on objective measures of psychological indices that are known to be related to positive and negative adjustment. Future research that compares gifted students who are ability grouped or accelerated with those who are not on standardized, objective measures of adjustment would strengthen the empirical base for specific recommendations.

A third limitation is that the common methodology in research on grade-skipping and early entrance to college is ex post facto design, a methodology limited in that it does not control for preexisting group differences on outcome measures. Therefore, we must make caveats before making broad generalizations about the social or emotional impact of acceleration and ability grouping.

The fourth limitation is the voluntary nature of participation in most accelerated or ability-grouped programs. There may be significant differences between those students (and their families) who choose to accelerate learning, select homogenous grouping options, and even load up on advanced classes and their gifted classmates who do not pursue these options. It may be that students who make such choices are better adjusted and demonstrate greater social and emotional maturity than those who do not.

It is often impossible in the research to separate the effects of the accelerated content from the effects of peer ability grouping. When benefits are observed, was it the advanced curriculum that made the difference or the new access to true peers? Gross’s (Gross, 2003, 2004; Gross & van Vliet, 2005) analyses suggest that it was some of both.

Unanswered Questions

With the exception of Gross’s longitudinal study (1993, 2003; Gross & van Vliet, 2005) no studies examined the socio-affective impact of capable children who were eligible for accelerative options and remained in the regular classroom. Is there harm in not pursuing such options? Gross (1993, 2003) found significant negative effects for the highly gifted children in her sample. Similarly, what happens to students who are dissatisfied in the regular classroom and seek accelerative options to no avail? We do not have research to address that question either.

Few of the studies on early college admission compared early entrants with non-accelerants to help determine the extent to which acceleration contributes to the observed positive effects (Janos, Robinson, & Lunneborg, 1989; Noble, Robinson, & Gunderson, 1993; Robinson, 2004; Robinson & Janos, 1986). It is possible that students who choose early entrance to college are different from those who do not on some other variable that contributes to their success. Given that few studies compare matched samples of early entrants with students who choose to stay in high school, we do not know how much better or worse their adjustment is than that of students who enter college at age 18. Is the initial period of adjustment for freshman tougher if they are 16 or 14? What differences, if any, are there between gifted college students who enter college at 18 and those who enter at younger ages? What kinds of support, family history, or personal characteristics if any, make a difference for early entrants (Robinson, 2004)?

Although there is a large volume of research on the impact of ability grouping on academic outcomes, there is little research on its effects on social or emotional indicators, making it harder to draw unequivocal recommendations. Most of the earlier research on ability grouping focused on issues of equity or the differences in achievement outcomes of students assigned to different ability groups (Hoffer, 1992; Natriello, Pallas, & Alexander, 1989; Oakes, 1985, 1989; Slavin, 1990). Little of the research has explored the ways in which ability grouping affects objective indices of social or emotional functioning.

Future research should explore the antecedents of various effects, and we need more studies conducted with comparison groups that rely on recognized standard measures of adjustment. We do not know how ability grouping affects motivation, efficacy, or perceptions of ability in oneself and others. We also know surprisingly little about the friendship patterns of gifted adolescents who are accelerated and those who are not.

Summary

Given that feelings, perceptions, attitudes, and social relations can facilitate or hinder learning, it is essential that the socio-affective impact of various educational practices be assessed. Regarding acceleration, we have sufficient research to conclude confidently that accelerated gifted children, as a group, are no more at risk for social or emotional difficulties than are other children. At the same time, there is little evidence to support the claim that accelerated gifted children have a socio-affective advantage over gifted children who are not accelerated.

Although the research consistently finds no ill group effects, some accelerated gifted children do have adjustment difficulties (e.g., Gagné & Gagnier, 2004). Important individual differences in perceived social and emotional adjustment have been noted among accelerated gifted children in some studies. Proponents of acceleration must be careful to acknowledge this and to guard against giving the impression that there are never any problems when children are accelerated.

Peer ability grouping has differential socio-affective effects and seems to be more advantageous for some students than for others. In particular, the limited research evidence suggests homogeneous grouping arrangements are more strongly associated with positive adjustment outcomes among highly gifted children, although this connection is less clear with moderately gifted students. Gross and van Vliet’s (2005) research does suggest that failure to accelerate some highly gifted children can cause relationship problems that last well into adulthood.

There is some evidence to suggest that peer ability grouping may also be more strongly related to positive social and emotional outcomes for gifted minority students, but more research is needed to verify whether this relationship exists for larger numbers of such students.

When the negative effects of ability grouping are observed we must use caution in our interpretation of them. In some cases, authors have interpreted the data to support a favored viewpoint, rather than putting forth multiple interpretations for consideration. For instance, the finding in some studies that accelerated students spend less time in social activities may indicate a negative change in socialization patterns, or it may indicate that the child is now happily spending more time in talent development and has less time and interest for social activities. A decline in self-esteem may indicate a negative attitude, or it may reflect a more realistic appraisal of one’s abilities.

Although the research finds academic and achievement benefits for ability grouping for gifted students, the research does not support the claim of social or emotional benefits for such grouping arrangements. Although advantages in peer relations, motivation, career development, and attitudes toward school have been documented for some gifted students, there is evidence that heterogeneous grouping is an advantage for others as long as the challenging curriculum is provided.

References

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AuthorAffiliation

Maureen Neihart

National Institute of Education, Singapore

AuthorAffiliation

Author’s Note: Address correspondence concerning this article to Maureen Neihart, Psychological Studies Academic Group, Blk 2 Level 3 Rm 78, National Institute of Education, 1 Nanyang Walk, Singapore 637616; e-mail: maureenneihart@gmail.com.

Note: This article accepted under the editorship of Paula OlszewskiKubilius.

AuthorAffiliation

Maureen Neihart, PsyD, is a licensed clinical child psychologist. She is coeditor of the text, The Social and Emotional Development ofGifted Children: What Do We Know? and has given several hundred talks and workshops worldwide. Dr. Neihart and her husband hail from Montana, where they were licensed as therapeutic treatment foster parents and worked with seriously emotionally disturbed adolescents in their home. In 2006, they moved to Singapore, where she is associate professor of psychological studies at theNational Institute of Education. In her spare time, Dr. Neihart enjoys camping, trekking, and writing fiction. Her one-act comedy TheCourt Martial of George Armstrong Custer was produced and filmed for local television in 2000.

Five Powerful Ways to Open a Presentation

By 

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We’ve all been there before: staring at the glow of your blank computer screen with no idea on how to open or start your talk. For starters, you should never be staring at PowerPoint with no clear objective (that’s a conversation for another day), but let’s be honest, we’ve all struggled with the best ways to open a presentation.
It’s time to get unstuck. Here are 5 powerful ways to open a presentation:1. Use Silence
Most people won’t be able to pull this off very easily, but if you are feeling like a rockstar during your next presentation, opt for silence. Say a few words then be quiet. Say a few more words then be quiet. It’s a quick and easy way to own the room. Just make sure you can hold your composure.2. Point to the Future or Past
I have two simple statements for you:
-Prospective (looking to the future): “30 Years from now, your job won’t exist.”
-Retrospective (looking to the past): “In 1970, Japan owned 9% of the market. Today, they own 37%.”
The reality is that looking into the future or past always sparks engagement since that’s where our hearts live.

3. Quote Someone
The easiest way to open a talk is simply to quote someone. Think about that last presenter you heard when they opened their talk with a quote from Albert Einstein or Napoleon. A quote equals instant credibility.

4. Share Something Extraordinary
I don’t know about you, but I love Snapple. Even more so, I love their bottle caps since they always share fun facts or extraordinary insight into ordinary things. Is my life going to be improved because I know how many times a bee’s wings flaps in a second? No. Is it crazy interesting? Yes.

5. Tell a Story
Here’s the amazing thing about stories: If your presentation is based solely on facts and stats then your audience is going to react in one of two ways: 1) agree or 2) disagree. However, if you tell a story, your audience will participate with you. Still not sold? Stories have been known to increase audience retention by up to 26%.

So, what are you waiting for? Experiment. Try something new. Step outside your comfort zone. You’ll see some amazing results by trying any one of these techniques.

Scott Schwertly is the author of How to Be a Presentation God and CEO of Ethos3, a Nashville, TN-based presentation boutique providing professional presentation design and training for national and international clients, ranging from Fortune 500 companies to branded individuals like Guy Kawasaki.

Five Things to Make Your Schools the School of Choice

By Rich Bagin, Executive Director of the National School Public Relations Association

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Rich Bagin accepting the “Outstand Freind of Public Education award, presented by Eric King, President-elect of the HML

Rich Bagin accepted the award for the 2017 “Outstanding Friend of Public Education.”

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Here are 5 things to consider when attempting to make your schools your community’s schools of choice:

1.       Focus on the LOCAL SCHOOL, not the School District per se.
Now maybe the time to take a different strategy when it comes to competing in this era of choice.
We can continue to whiz on one another when it comes to achievement results, graduation rates, college acceptances, etc. We also can brag about the fact that we teach all students — not just those who could be considered, in youth sports vernacular, the traveling squad of an elite under-13 b-ball team.
But guess what?
Much of what we say doesn’t matter.
As much as that hurts me to say it, much of what we say doesn’t matter. But we do need to continue to say it with new approaches and different audiences.
Only our advocates and perhaps a few reporters seem to listen to us.
So to return to this era of political communication, you can see that OUR base listens to us, while THEIR base obviously doesn’t.
I am asking you to consider switching strategies.
Focus on your individual schools because on the local level, your Snyder Elementary School is being compared to the ABC Charter Academy down the street.
It is time to talk about individual schools and not just your school district.
For most parents and decision makers, it becomes a SCHOOL versus SCHOOL issue.
I urge you take a fresh look at this approach and begin a process of defining an identity program that is built by parents and staff at each of your schools.

Your staff and parents need to believe that Snyder Elementary School offers a great opportunity for their children and that your staff goes the extra mile and cares about their children.

This July, NSPRA will be offering a guidebook on Making and Marketing Your School as a School of Choice on this topic. The booklet explains a process of getting staff and parents together, collaborating to solve some image problems that their school may have, and then developing a marketing plan to maintain and boost enrollment in their school. It also urges readers to look at the messaging of the ABC Academy on the other side of the street, see what they tout that may be attacking one of your perceived weaknesses.

Taking this School versus School approach allows you to play your comprehensive district’s card as a value-added benefit.

All the auxiliary services and benefits that you provide — from counseling, the spectrum of Special Ed programs, co-curricular opportunities, and enhanced technology programs — all add up to a major plus when people consider choosing a school.

If what you offer is unmatched, say so with a checklist approach similar to a report card that clearly communicates what your competing charter doesn’t have. We need to be proactive about our attributes in this era of competition.

A commitment to this school-by-school strategy can benefit you in various ways:

It can reduce your need to focus on perceived Big Public Education problems. You will be dealing with what’s really important to your local community, their kids, and their schools.

Our research over the past 10 years continues to reveal that school-based communication is often the most read communication offering in school districts today. You have always had the attention of parents. But now in this era of over-communication, it is more important than ever.
Believe it or not, in a single second, 2.5 million emails are sent, and in that same second:-

  • 193,000 text messages are posted
  • 219,000 posts are added to Facebook
  • 7,2590 tweets are sent

To break through this clutter, you need an interested audience.
And you have it, for the most part, with your PARENTS.
Most parents and families have a vested interest in their child’s school ¾ much more than in your school district. Take advantage of it and build support at the school level.

It will spill over into their next school in your district and continue through their entire time with your schools. You can then convert these parents into supporters for your schools. They understand your schools and will not believe the public-education bashing because their experience trumps all the negative rhetoric they hear.

But this will not happen unless we continue to be proactive in developing school communication programs at each school.

2. Internal Communication is critical to be successful. Create a CULTURE OF COMMUNICATION in your districts.

As we complete communication audits for school districts across the country, we see that by far the weakest component is internal communication.

Ideally, we want all staff to become ambassadors for their schools, to vote in finance elections where it applies, and to become advocates for their schools, their children, and their communities. Unfortunately, this rarely happens.

Lots of lip service is given to having internal communication but it often breaks down quickly as pockets of staff have little knowledge or a feeling that they know what is really going on.

They report little authentic engagement — even when their input is sought on topics of mutual interest. Most school districts have a problem in closing the communication loop when it comes to internal communication.

Superintendents can make a big difference in setting the parameters for the importance of communication at every level. Our experience tells us that communication accountability is rarely measured and that may be the clue to solve this disparity.

We need to hold principals, central office administrators, service personnel supervisors, and others accountable with a communication component in their evaluations. (What gets measured gets done.)

Some do a great job communicating internally, while others ignore it. I can’t tell you how many times we have heard from a staff member, “Well, I find out what’s happening around here by calling my colleague in another building because their principal tells her staff what is going on and why decisions are made.”

In many cases, the staff actually want to know what’s going on and can’t get an answer without fishing for it.

It does not have to be that way.

As superintendents, you can begin by modeling an approach to start the process to make internal communication a priority. You can begin by planting the seeds for a culture of communication in your district.

All staff are part of your communication effort and, by making a commitment to communication awareness and with a bit of training, you can make it happen.

To make my point about the power of internal communication, one staff member recently reported from an audit of a school district with 25,000 students:

“When the district’s tagline is not believed by the frontline, this district is headed for big trouble.”

Repeat, “When the district’s tagline is not believed by the frontline, this district is headed for big trouble.”

3.       Like it or not, political communication is now part of our jobs.
There is no denying that our jobs have changed. The new wave of elected officials is empowered as a result of their recent victories. They psychologically seem to be on a roll and are attempting to move their agenda as quickly as possible. So like it or not, we need to think like a politician.

Here’s some insight:

Jay Rosen writing for a New York University publication asked us to answer these questions if we are to think politically:

  • What do we stand for that others also believe in?
  • Who is aligned against us?
  • Where are we most vulnerable?
  • What are our opponents’ strengths?
  • How can we broaden our base?
  • Who are our natural allies?
  • What can we unite around, despite our internal differences?
  • What are the overlapping interests that might permit us to make common cause with people who are not (education leaders)?

And David Ignatius of The Washington Post, wrote a piece after the election entitled, The Truth Is Losing. In an interview with the State Department’s Richard Stengel, Ignatius offered:

“We like to think that truth has to battle itself out in the marketplace of ideas. Well, it may be losing in that marketplace today. Simply having fact-based messaging is not sufficient to win the information war.”

The article points out that going “tit for tat” in arguing with extremists through social media was not that fruitful. Stengel noted that by empowering others to be the messenger, they could make the case more emphatically. “The central insight was that we’re not the best messenger for our messages because in the post-truth world, the people we are trying to reach automatically question anything from the U.S. government.” With today’s climate, this may ring true with some of your audiences as well.

Have others tell your story: Begin or revitalize a true Key Communicator Program

In my 40 years in this business, I  have never seen this tactic fail if executed correctly—Never!

Over the years, it has been watered down by some as an old-fashioned listserv, but used correctly, a Key Communicator Program can be valuable.

Some key points are:

This trust-building tactic is critical in today’s instant communication world. You truly need a Key Communicator Program to inspire confidence in what you say and do. It adds credibility.

Unfortunately over recent years, as I already noted, we’ve seen an increase of Key Communicator Programs that have turned into little more than listservs in certain communities. If you’re tapping the old and new power structures in your community, regularly meeting with small segments of your key communicators, and communicating with them electronically, you’ll be on your way to building a base of well-respected spokespeople for your schools. As David Ogilvy reminded us, “Don’t count the people that you reach, reach the people who count.”

Remember, many parents and others may prefer to hear their school messages from respected leaders and neighbors rather than from school officials. If run appropriately, this Key Communicator process can help you develop credibility in this era of anything-goes social media.

One last note on Key Communicators: People need to get to know you face to face. Only then can you can begin using your earned credibility through videos, Twitter, email, Facebook, etc. But first, you need to start with in-person meetings — otherwise people may just see you as another empty pitchman or woman for your schools — sort of like the ones you see on late-night insurance commercials.

May the truth be known: Set-the-record-straight feature on websites and social media

We’ve seen districts dedicate a section on their websites or Facebook pages to setting the record straight. Even though research may show that fake news may still overcome this practice, it’s often refreshing for school employees to know that someone is defending “the truth” about their schools. And in some ways, it shows that the superintendent has their collective backs.

Be prepared. Set up a process for staff to report fake news items to you so that your leadership is aware of what’s out there. Once you know, you can decide what to do or not to do but, some staff member who has good judgment should be responsible to monitor the fake news front on a daily basis.

4.       Support communication as a management function.

By now, I hope you are beginning to see that communication should be a management function. You need to integrate communication into all that you do or you will risk losing the battle we now face. A strong communication function will help you advance your system during this period of uncertainty.

As you can see by now, I am not talking just about great publicity but about engagement, marketing, reputation management, ongoing internal engagement, and external communication programs.

You need to have someone who knows what they are doing to make your communication function be as effective as it can be.

Former vice President Joe Biden, (“Uncle Joe” to some of us), often says he can tell an organization’s priorities very quickly by looking at their line-item budgets.

Using Uncle Joe’s formula, I can tell you that communication is not a priority in most school districts right now. Our research shows that most NSPRA districts spend just one tenth of one percent of their entire school district budget on communication. One tenth of one percent — that’s .001% — Really? Charter organizations are spending from 10 to 25% or more on their communication and marketing efforts according to our observations. Budget wise, this is not a fair fight!

Every year for our Annual Seminar, we receive proposals to run sessions entitled PR on Shoestring. During my tenure, we’ve never accepted any of them because that’s the wrong message to send if we want to make a management commitment to communication. And most of these shoestring programs normally trip over their own laces and die easily because the district made no commitment to it.

Communication must be a management function.

5.       We need to tell our stories, and leverage technology and our integrity

We need to share many of our best stories so our key audiences understand what we are all about. Quick videos can help and use them through social media can make a difference.

Recently we ran a story from a Missouri district that told its story of middle school students crafting new laws for their municipality, discussing their ideas with a volunteer community lawyer, and then going to court to present their new proposals to a local courtroom judge. This project demonstrated kids and teachers having fun through the teaching/learning experience. It was a great story.

We know that hundreds of relevant, uplifting stories happen every day. It’s our job to share them with our communities.

Since technology is exploding in our field of communication, you can leverage it to expand your reach and vitality in your community. Just make sure the focus meets your strategic messages for your school community. Make sure your social media efforts are completed with a purpose.

And finally, in this fake-news, alternative-fact world, you need to bring integrity into this discussion. Character counts in our world of communication.

We see so much twisting of facts, just plain mistruths or half-truths along with the fake news accounts. Your staff and community need to know that you stand for integrity.

Today, with a smartphone, anyone can publish any falsehood. But reasonable parents, staff, and others need to know what’s true, where you stand, and how you will lead your system. Don’t let silence create a vacuum—your critics will quickly fill it.

We have always said that the term “PR” really stands for 2 items:

Having a Public Responsibility to communicate

And Developing Public Relationships.

That is where we build credibility and trust through authentic communication.

Today, I thank the Horace Mann League for its award and I am committed to making even more Friends of Public Education as we all know that we need as many friends as we can get.

Please join me in making that happen. Because I ask if we do not do it, who will?

Make that commitment at the local level now, more than ever.

Thanks again.

_______

Thanks to HML leadership and the Executive Board for this honor.  I have always found it easy to be a friend of public education ¾ like most people in this room, I have devoted just about all my career building more support for public education.

And one note before I try to persuade you as to why we need more communication and engagement than ever since we are in an Era of Viral Disruption — as Ted Koppel puts it.

 Our opposition often throws nonsense into the discussion just to distract us from what they are trying to accomplish.

I want to stop and also thank my wife, Carolyn, who has been a vital force in the success of my career and has brought much happiness and value to my life. Thanks, Dear… I wish even more people knew how truly special you are. But we do have one glimmer of that as she has just won an international business communication award which she will pick up in Dublin, Ireland, next October.

The new leadership in Washington is creating fear and confrontation, proposing weaker funding, and increasing doubt about what I call Big Public Education. (Gallup Reference/PDK Big Education is a collection of the highly ranked local schools—go figure!)

And the new administration’s misguided optimism is like our first-year teachers who are ready to conquer the world for their students. And even though it seems that the administration is succeeding at this point, they, like our first-year teachers, are beginning to realize that achieving their mission may not be as easy as it seems.

Their overall mission seems to be killing public education as a viable pathway for all our students—not just those students in their charter or voucher schools.

Our nation’s system of check and balances is helping to stop them, but our education community needs to do more to create hurdles, roadblocks, and pressure wherever we can. And we also need to continue to do great work!

Now we have been fighting this bashing for some time. And, like you, I am sick and tired of defending what we do for children ¾ along with the notion that what we do is not nearly enough.

At NSPRA, we applaud and admire Horace Mann League and I hope you appreciate the changes made by HML in the past few years. The league is now providing you with helpful ammunition of persuasive articles every Monday morning. We tip our hat to Jack McKay and others who help make that happen.

To help in that effort, NSPRA also publishes all the persuasive articles we can by pointing out the silly comparisons and foibles being promoted by our competition.

The facts are ¾ if anyone pays attention to facts these days ¾ that our public schools are doing exceedingly well where we have the resources and the consistency of leadership to do our jobs.

Yes, consistency of leadership is so important as I’ve learned from my years in this business. If anything, our school boards need to learn from professional sports ¾ don’t change your superintendent every 2 to 3 years unless you want to consistently fail and badger your staff with start/stop initiatives.

Public education continues to improve and, yet, we still have pockets of students who need much more than instructional assistance — as Jim Harvey clearly pointed out in his recent study and the impactful HML report: The Iceberg Effect.

You know better than others just how hard it is to teach children who do not show up or who are dealing with health, poverty, hunger, and lack of home support.

So, now, let me give you my take on what to do about all this from a communication, engagement and strategic standpoint:

First, let me say that it appears that charters are here to stay.

I know that some states are still combatting new legislation, but we feel the charter train has left the station. Vouchers, however, are a much different story.

And for anyone who will listen, a number of recent studies have shown that students in voucher programs do not achieve well in their new settings.

In any event, we see using public dollars for private schools as wrong.

That doesn’t mean we cannot work together and collaborate for the good of the community where possible, but funding private schools with public dollars is just a no-no as far as we are concerned.

While completing a communication audit years ago, a wise superintendent told me that he legally does all he can for the parochial schools in his district. He said, “Rich, after all, THEY ARE ALL OUR CHILDREN.”

That’s a good approach and it worked well for his school community.

The Unintended Consequences of Charters

By Jack McKay, Ed.D., Executive Director of the Horace Mann League of the USA

Charter schools have a unique history. The idea of charter schools arose, often with teachers’ support, in urban districts in the late 1980s and early ’90s. They were originally conceived as teacher-run schools that would serve students struggling inside the traditional system and would operate outside the reach of the administrative bureaucracy and politicized school boards.

Charters also drew on early rounds of small school experiments initiated by teachers and community activists, often as alternatives to large, struggling, high schools.

A charter school is an independently run public school granted greater flexibility in its operations, in return for greater accountability for performance. The “charter” establishing each school is a performance contract detailing the school’s mission, program, students served, performance goals, and methods of assessment.

The Charter School movement was intended to be a school where the so-called, bureaucracy of traditional public schools is eliminated, to provide a choice for students and parents, to provide a sense of competition with the public schools, improve academic outcomes, and to create an environment for creativity in instruction and organization of the school.

As the charter school initiative grew, some educational leaders became concerned that that charter school advocates were creating tiers of schools serving decidedly different populations with unequal resources.  Below is a summary of the intended and resulting unintended consequences of the charter school movement.

Intended and Unintended Consequences of Charter Schools

Bureaucracy

Intention: Reduce the rules and regulations that may hinder the selection of personnel, curriculum, and methods of teaching.

Unintended Consequence: (1) resulted in a lack of due process rights of employees and students. (2) resulted in a lack of policy on the uniformity of personnel regulations, salary, and benefits. (3) Resulted in a lack of structure or procedures to resolve grievances in a fair and efficient manner.

Choice of School

Intention: Provide parents with an alternative to the traditional public school.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in a choice based on race, wealth, and/or other forms of exclusiveness rather than academics, resulting in segregated schools.  (2) Created a “duel” system of schooling in the community. (3) Results in a perpetuation of a false sense populist elitism of both parents and children.

Competition

Intention: Provide a sense of competition to find better ways to improve learning.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in no evidence of the benefits of competition to promoted innovation or improved learning. (2) Resulted in a false sense of academic success based on aggressive recruitment (enrolling already talented students) and (3) Resulted in the suspension of the less able students.

Governance

Intention: Reduce the outside influence by appointing rather than electing a board.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in limited or no review of practices by an impartial board.  No due process or other appeal procedures for either students or employees. (2) Resulted in a less stable, less secure and less expensive teaching staff. (3) Resulted in less experienced, less unionized and less trained and less certified than those in public schools – the Walmart strategy of low salaries, fewer benefits, no long-term career, no pension plan, nor professional commitment

Innovations in Teaching

Intention: Provide a teaching environment unhindered by structure and standards.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in no evidence to show any significant innovations shared or integrated into the public schools.  (2) Resulted in the reverse – most innovations in teaching and learning developed and implemented in the public school are adopted by the charter school. (3) Resulted in unregulated charters that provide the teachers and resources for a few at the expense of the many. (4) Resulted in the draining of the talents, resources, and energy needed to continuous improvement of the public schools where 95 percent of the students attend.

Innovation in Organization

Intention: Provide an environment that nurtures different ways of organizing the school’s learning areas.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in few, if any innovative or organization practice has been proven to be an improvement over the current practices in the public schools. (2) Resulted in charter school practices being more regressive in dealing with instruction and classroom management. (2) Nowhere have charters produced a template for effective districtwide reform or equity.

Academic Improvement

Intention: Provide strategies and practices that result in higher academic achievement.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in no major research that indicates that charter schools have improved the achievement of students during the last 15 years. (2) Resulted in most charters avoid accepting the less academically able, the physically impaired, second language students, or the children of poverty. (3) Resulted in most charters being selective in recruiting the most talented and most motivated learners from the public schools. (4) Resulted in the myth that charters do better than public schools – reality is that when eliminating the bottom half by selective recruiting and timely suspensions, test scores will go up.

 Academic Accountability

Intention: Provide methods to hold teachers and schools accountable for academic results.

Unintended Consequence: (1) Resulted in privately operated charters having no obligation to show the effectiveness of teachers nor schools.  Studies have found that there no reliable way to measure value-added student achievement.

Fiscal Accountability

Intention: Provide practices that allocate resources that that better address the learning of students.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in privately operated charters having arbitrarily set salaries, bonuses, and benefits.  (2) Resulted in accountability is to the stockholders, rather than to students, taxpayers, and patrons. (3) Resulted in investigations indicating high levels of fraud, profiteering due to a lack of transparency, mismanagement with no oversight. (4) Resulted in the higher percent of special needs students left in public schools (5) Resulted in a higher cost-per-student in public schools and lower cost-per-student in charters.

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Intention: A different learning experience based on the freedom to innovate.  An alternative to the public school. One that places greater emphasis on academics and strong discipline.

Unintended Consequences: (1) Resulted in skimming already talented students from public schools. (2) While public schools welcome all students.  Charters are selective in recruiting students – often using skimming strategies to recruit talented students and motivated parents from public schools. (3) Resulted in a segregated school-based open an elitist and populist sense of entitlement for children. (4) Resulted with the bottom line logic, the market will do for education what it has done for housing, health care, and employment: create fabulous profits and opportunities for a few, and unequal access and outcomes for the many.

Strategic Communications for Leading Change

by Connie R Kindler, Director of Professional Development
Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators.

“Leaders anticipate the future. They stand at the edge of the known world, patrolling the border between “now” and “next” to spot trends. They help others see the future, too, guiding people through the unexpected and inspiring them to long for a better reality. The leader’s role, your role, is to light the way for your team through empathetic communications – to be a torchbearer.” (Illuminate, Duarte and Sanchez)

Those who rise to school leadership usually do so because they have demonstrated an ability to inspire and guide others. They almost innately understand when there is a need for transformation, as well as the path to achieving it. However, sometimes their efforts are derailed when those that they lead do not understand or support the change. Nancy Duarte, the CEO of Duarte Design, and Patty Sanchez, the firm’s Chief Strategy Officer, studied Starbucks, Interface, Rackspace, Chick-fil-A and other companies to create the largest design firm in Silicon Valley. In Illuminate: Ignite Change Through Speeches, Stories, Ceremonies and Symbols, they identify five distinct stages (Dream, Leap, Fight, Climb and Arrive) of the change process when strategic communications from the organization’s leader are imperative. To create a culture changing movement, they recommend using speeches, stories, ceremonies, and symbols at critical junctures during the five stages:

• Speeches can distance others from “what is” by identifying “what could be.” Duarte and Sanchez advise the leader to directly address the anticipated thoughts, emotions and reactions of those impacted, to persuasively contrast the current situation with the desired one, and to clearly state the call to action.

• Stories are more easily remembered and shared. To connect hearts and minds, they propose interjecting stories into speeches about those who have tried, failed and overcome.

• Ceremonies lead to collective emotions and create commitment. They suggest facilitating ceremonies to mark important transitions.

• Integrating symbols creates solidarity. To create solidarity, they endorse the integration of symbols that represent the desired thoughts, feelings, and values of your end result, and to share these proudly throughout the process.

As you ponder the changes that you envision for your organization, it will be beneficial to include communication strategies recommended by Duarte and Sanchez. Chart your journey from the “Dream” to the “Arrive” stages and mark the important milestones when momentum can be created through these strategic communications.

• In preparation for your opening day remarks, directly address anticipated resistance, develop a persuasive contrast of the current reality with the desired one, include a compelling story that illustrates the transformation, add a representative symbol, create your call to action, and demonstrate confidence and conviction. If your vision is truly “illuminated” for those that you lead, they will follow you as you carry the torch to your destination.

Leadership and the Inverted “U”

By Jack McKay

Interest in the “Inverted U” was started after reading Malcom Gladwell’s recent book, David and Galiath (2013).  Gladwell presents the case that “too much of a good thing” as it relates to class size. His point is that as the class size is lowered, achievement is better, but only to a point.  If class size becomes too small, then there is a marginal or negative effect on learning. Other words, “too much of a good thing can result in a negative result.”

Is it practical to apply the “Inverted U” theory to other educationally related issues?

The “Inverted U Theory,” developed in 1908 by Yerkes and Dobson as a way of explaining that arousal (e.g., motivation or stress) increases to an optimal level of performance. However, if arousal (e.g., motivation and stress) continues to increase beyond the optimal level, then performance will begin to deteriorate.

Researchers has found that different tasks require different levels of motivation for optimal performance. For example, difficult or intellectually demanding tasks may require a lower level of motivation (to facilitate concentration), whereas tasks demanding stamina or persistence may be performed better with higher levels of motivation.

The effect of task difficulty led to the hypothesis that the Yerkes–Dodson Law can be decomposed into two distinct factors as in a bathtub curve. The upward part of the inverted U can be thought of as the energizing. The downward part is caused by the negative effects of motivation (or stress) on cognitive processes like attention, e.g., tunnel vision, memory and problem-solving.

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Following are a series of charts using the “inverted curve” to show that while the intentions of a school reform, designed by policy makers as well intended, are now resulting in unintended consequences.  Over the past 10 to 20 years, public school leaders and advocates have been presented with a series of efforts to improve student achievement.  These range from (a) increased funding by corporations and foundations intended to change the public schools, (b) increased federal mandates and programs to improve accountability, (c) increase alternative means of providing education in a community through privatization and competition and (d) evaluating teachers to improve instruction and remove the incompetent.  While noble in appearance, in each case there are unintended consequences –other words “too much of a good thing.”

 

Federal state intervention Accountability (Testing)

Most notably, the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act, passed by Congress in 2002, was designed to be a flagship federal aid program for disadvantaged students.  The NCLB supports standards-based education reform based on the premise that setting high standards and establishing measurable goals can improve individual outcomes in education. The intended motivation was to hold educators accountable by testing and rewarding those school districts that improved student performance.

The primary outcome of NCLB has been an increase in the testing of students.  An ideal outcome of testing would be to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the school’s instructional practices.  More specifically, the intent would be to provide the faculty with diagnostic information about their students in order to improve student achievement.

However, the unintended consequence of testing has been the trend of teaching the content of the test, thereby reducing or channeling the curriculum.  Content not included on the test, such as the arts, music, physical education are reduced or deleted from the instructional program.  Further, with the testing comes the unreliable comparison of teachers, schools, systems and communities.  With the emphasis on test results published in the media, there is a tendency to judge the effectiveness of the teachers and the school system based solely on outcomes rather than other social and economic issues facing influencing the incoming students.

Finally, there is the pheonomen called Campbell’s Law:  “The more any quantitative social indicator is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.”  Campbell’s Law explains why there have been a number of scandals related to testing (Houston ISD 2003, 2011 and 2013, Atlanta (2010), Washington, DC 2013)).

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Privatization and Competition for students

Privatization is intended to improve the efficiency of the organization, in this case, public schools. The underlying idea is that in a democratic society, a person should have a choice and also where to have their children attend school.  Privatization is an attempt to increase the quality of education through increase the management of scares resources by using the practices and procedures successfully used in the private sector.  It is believed that through privatization, the following will occur: (1) increasing competency-based teaching, (2) increasing the time of self-learning via technology, (3) greater use of group learning, (4) decreasing the teacher-dominated learning practices, and (5) practice continuous evaluation through the use of testing and monitoring student progress through the use of technology.

However, privatization has resulted in the increasing selectivity of the inputs (the capability of the students), inappropriate rankings of schools, and diminished local control the community’s schools.

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School Choice

School choice is a term or label given to a wide array of programs offering students and their families alternatives to publicly provided schools, to which students are generally assigned by the location of their family residence. School choice is sold on the idea that it empowers parents to choose what is believed best for their children.  Examples of school choice may involve vouchers to attend private or charter schools.

However, what school choice creates is a climate of self-interest over what might be best for other children and the long-term impact on the community.  Unintended consequences of school choice range from creating a dual educational system to segregating the community on social and economic lines.  Further consequences are increasing inequities in educational opportunity, narrowing the curriculum to ensure higher test results and competitive advantage for recruitment, along with selective recruiting efforts to attract only the most capable students – skimming the public schools.  Finally, there is no reliable evidence that the charter school experience, with less bureaucratic control, improves student achievement nor has led to any significant innovations of instruction and organization.

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Foundation and Corporate Grants

Foundation and corporate funding of public education can be positive or negative, depending on the purpose or objective of the contributor.  Usually, the motive of a foundation or corporation appears to be holistic, but the unintended consequences ranging from the integrity of the school’s mission or to the research outcomes.  Foundations like Gates and Walmart have invested heavily in the areas of accountability.  These efforts related to imposing a business model of measuring outcomes based on controlling the incoming raw materials – contrary to the public school model of accepting all students, regarding of social class and level of preparation for schooling.

Beyond the corporate model of controlling inputs is the undue influence on decision-making on the local school board, the dependence on outside funding sources, as well as the potential increase in the inequity of the distribution of funds within and through a school system and state.

Somewhat related is the integrity of educational association aligned public education.  Once respected national educational associations like the National Education Association (NEA), the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the Association for School Curriculum and Instruction (ASCD) and the publications like the Chronicle of Higher Education and Education Week, are now facing an integrity issue related to their editorials and research.  Even the U.S. Department of Education, under the leadership of Arne Duncan, has been strongly implicated with ties to the Gates Foundation, thereby creating an integrity issue with motives at the federal policy level.

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The Gates Foundation, for example, has significantly changed the level of influence over legislative policies about education, e.g., testing, teacher evaluation, school organization and merit pay.  By buying legislation, the desired change in more likely to last and feel more like routine governance.

 

Teacher Evaluation Process

The reform efforts surrounding teacher evaluation have been related to value added measures (VAM).  VAM are designed to estimate the teacher’s effect on student learning.  Policy makers believe that emphasis on the impact of a teacher on student learning, over a period of time, will improve the quality of the teaching profession.  A number of prominent researchers have concluded there is no evidence to support value added measures as a reliable indicator of successful teaching.  Research evidence suggests that the unintended consequences of VAM are such things as deteriorating collaboration, increased turnover of faculty, and an increase of administrative time to carry out the related observations and documentation relative to improved instruction.  A complimentary motive of teacher evaluations is to reward those outstanding teachers with higher salaries – merit pay.

There is no reliable evidence to suggest that greater emphasis on the teacher evaluation process motivates teachers to improve and therefore paid a higher salary.  Regarding merit pay, there is considerable research that suggests that monetary rewards (merit pay) are not valid incentives to improve performance in a cognitive activity such as teaching. In teaching, where thousand of decisions are made about classroom management, instructional practices and diagnostic are made daily, altruism trumps money (Heyman and Arueky) .

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There is no reliable evidence to suggest that greater emphasis on the teacher evaluation process motivates teachers to improve and therefore paid a higher salary.  Regarding merit pay, there is considerable research that suggests that monetary rewards (merit pay) are not valid incentives to improve performance in a cognitive activity such as teaching. In teaching, where thousands of decisions are made about classroom management, instructional practices and diagnostic are made daily, altruism trumps money (Heyman and Arueky).

Summary
As stated, “too much of a good thing” can result in some unintended consequences.  While well intended, some of the recent efforts to reform public education by zealous reformers have not developed as planned.  Most efforts to improve the public schools have been directed towards the management of resources (e.g., charters and vouchers) and personnel (e.g., teachers and students) and placed an emphasis on the outputs of the education process (e.g., testing and evaluation).  At the same time, the inputs have been ignored (e.g., adequate funding and the readiness of students entering school).

Why have the well-intended reforms been less than successful? First, reforms like increased testing, school choice, and teacher accountability, have little or no research data to justify the time and effort.  Testing places emphasis on scripting and passing, not learning.  School choice places emphasis on student recruitment, not on inclusiveness and innovation.  Teacher accountability places emphasis on competition and short-term rewards, not on collaboration and creativity.

References

Psychology Arousal – The Inverted Curve, by H. Chambers, http://pe-arousal.blogspot.com/2011/09/inverted-u-theory.html

Yerkes, R. M. & Dodson, J. D. (1908). The Relation of Strength of Stimulus to Rapidity of Habit-Formation. Journal of Comparative Neurology and Psychology, 18, 459-482.

Heyman James and Ariely, Dan, Effort for Payment: A tale of two markets. 2004, American Psychological Society.  http://web.mit.edu/ariely/www/MIT/Papers/2markets.pdf

The results, recently published in Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, show remarkably clear conclusions. In each of the conditions, all participants who were reminded of money demonstrated behaviors consistent with decreased interpersonal skills and increased personal performance.  http://psychcentral.com/news/2008/07/10/money-influences-behavior-more-than-we-think/2586.html