Read on Twitter
Despite all that's going on in the world, I'm still excited to share a bit about a new working paper meta-analyzing impact evaluations of efforts to improve low-performing schools and districts in the post-NCLB accountability era. https://www.edworkingpapers.com/ai20-274 1/12
The lit on this topic grew significantly in the last 10 years and has been described as “mixed,” so we were eager to see what we could learn about whether school improvement works, how long it takes, which policies are most effective, and which contexts have responded best. 2/12
We were broad in the school improvement policies we included which ranged from school and district turnaround, labeling, charter conversions, to school closures, as long as the policy targeted low-performing schools or systems. 3/12
We found more reason for optimism than the public narrative on turnaround might suggest. On average, these policies generated moderate (neither transformational nor trivial) impacts on high- and low-stakes math achievement and low-stakes English language arts achievement. 4/12
We find no effects on high-stakes ELA exams and no evidence of harm on non-test outcomes. The average reforms do not seem to require 3 years of implementation to demonstrate results, though gains do appear to increase the longer an intervention is implemented. 5/12
The studies included in our review examined policies with a variety of features. We find interventions that included extended learning time and/or teacher replacements were associated with the largest gains (though we can't say much about the nature of replacements). 6/12
Interventions targeting schools or districts serving majority-Latinx student populations saw the largest gains. One implication is the urgent need to identify more effective policies for improving low-performing schools serving large concentrations of Black students. 7/12
Other caveats: we could only analyze those policies that had been studied and papers that were published or otherwise publicly available. There may be even more effective avenues to improving low-performing schools that have not made their way into the "turnaround" lit. 8/12
We're also unable to comment in detail on the cost-effectiveness of various policies (though new funding is not a major predictor of effects), which along with political realities, may affect the viability of policy options and therefore should be examined more thoroughly. 9/12
Despite these limitations, we believe our findings suggest there is some hope for students served by the nation's lowest performing schools and districts. That said, we’re eager to hear any feedback you might have. 10/12
This paper is co-authored w/ the awesome @catarm2010, Kate Larned, @Sarah_Mehrotra & Cynthia Pollard @hgse @EdTrust & benefited from feedback of @KatieEGonzalez @LMiratrix @daphnabassok, @UVaCurry @UVABatten RAs, many turnaround study authors, & @EmpowerSchools support. 11/12
On a more personal note, between all members of our team over the course of working on this project, I believe we had 3 babies, 1 marriage, 3 new jobs, 5 new cities/states/countries, 1 global pandemic, and (speaking for myself) lots of good times. Thanks for reading! 12/12
