1. 2013 International SIM Conference
School Practices that Matter Most for High School and College Readiness
Elaine Allensworth
2013 International SIM Conference
Lawrence, KS
This could be a title slide

2. National Movement to Prepare All Students for College
Rise in educational aspirations
From 1981 to 2004, the percentage of students who expected to attain a bachelor’s degree or higher doubled--from 35% to 70%
Criticisms of low high school academic standards
Recognition that skills most needed in the workforce are the same as those for needed for college
Goal of the Obama administration that all students leave ready for college or careers
Change in focus from achievement to attainment
(National Center for Education Statistics, 2006)
President Obama’s first address to Congress signaled a shift in educational priorities. He committed his administration to ending the dropout crisis in the nation’s public high schools and ensuring that by 2020 America would once again lead the world in the proportion of its population with college degrees.

3. This is ambitious
As a nation, we’ve never come close to graduating all students college ready
About a quarter of students fail to graduate high school
About half of graduates nationwide have less than a 3.0 GPA
A quarter of ACT-taking graduates meet all 4 college-ready test benchmarks
Only small increases in 4-year college completion
32% of 25-to-29-year-olds have 4-year degrees in 2011 (22% in 1980)
38% of students enrolling in a 4-year college complete
Large inequalities in preparation & academic attainment
Graduation statistics are from NCES: _008.asp _345.asp.
ACT statistics are from ACT.
Statistics from NCES and ACT, Inc.

4. National Movement for More Rigorous Curriculum
Require all students to take a college preparatory curriculum
Chicago ended remedial courses, required college-prep courses for all in 1997
Expand AP courses, IB programs
Chicago expanded both considerably, beginning in 1997
Remediation through double-dosing
Chicago required 9th graders with 8th-grade scores below national median to take additional course in Algebra and/or English in 2003
Common core and next generation standards adopted by almost all states
Chicago adopted Instructional Development Systems, IDS in 2005
High quality curriculum & pedagogy designed by vendors
Aligned with ACT, formative and summative course assessments
Curriculum coaches, Professional development
These strategies had unexpected results in Chicago 4

5. Logic behind curricular push to increase college readiness
More challenging, college-oriented curriculum
Increased learning, Stronger skills
Higher educational attainment
Makes sense, right?

6. Logic Assumptions behind curricular push to increase college readiness? ?
More challenging, college-oriented curriculum
Increased learning, Stronger skills
Higher educational attainment
You can implement curriculum in ways where one piece does not lead to the other, or there are adverse effects. You can have increased learning, but no effect or lower educational attainment. You can have teachers implementing better curriculum, but no effect or weaker skills.

7. Logic Assumptions behind curricular push to increase college readiness? ?
More challenging, student-centered curriculum
Increased learning, Stronger skills
Higher educational attainment
Teacher 
Teachers need to understand the more challenging curriculum and know how to implement it. But to get students to do harder work means teachers also need them to work harder (study more, persist despite frustration) – need better skills around student motivation & classroom management. If they’re teaching content at a high level to students who are entering at low level, they need to know strategies to reach those students without losing students who already have strong skills. And at the h.s./middle school level, they aren’t just teaching one class. Schools need to distribute their teachers – if suddenly they need to offer 50% more algebra instruction or Algebra II to all students, they’re going to need more algebra teachers from somewhereSchools need to figure out how to program students, and can affect who is in their class and that is going to affect the classroom climate, learning pace, and students’ own conception of themselves.
Educational material
Students
The Instructional Triangle, Cohen and Ball, 1999


8. Success depends on the school organization and context
More challenging, college-oriented curriculum ?
Increased learning, Stronger skills ?
Higher educational attainment
Teacher 
Selective enrollment schools may not be affected at all. Schools with 20% students learning disabled, high mobility rates, poor school climate, little time for shared planning – figuring out how to implement new curriculum more likely to face challenges, or to distract attention from other needs that may be essential to get students in the building in the first place.
Students
Educational material

School Organization and Context

9. How do we make all of the work on the common core and new standards pay off with higher educational attainment?

10. Theme 1 Increasing instructional challenge may have no benefit for educational attainment (and even bring declines)… …unless accompanied by more attention to student behavior and support

11. Chicago was an early adopter of popular strategies to increase curricular rigor
One example: Eliminating remedial coursework & requiring a college-prep curriculum for all students (1997)
Three years of math
Algebra in 9th grade, followed by geometry and algebra II
Previously 2 years were required; many students took remedial math
Four years of English
English I through English IV
Previously many students took remedial English in 9th grade
Three years of social science
World studies, U.S. History and an elective
Previously 3 years required of any social studies course
Three years of lab science
Earth or Environmental Science; Biology; Chemistry or Physics
Previously 1 year required 11

12. Ending remedial coursework led more students to earn credit in Algebra or English I, but no other benefits
Change in Math Outcomes
Credit in Algebra I or Higher
Math Course Failure
Course Absences
Math grades (4 pt.)
Test Scores
Lowest Skilled
8.8%
7.7%
2.24
-0.15
0.63
Low Skilled
7.4%
3.6%
2.40
-0.07
0.13
Average
1.0%
1.3%
3.14
-0.01
-0.17
Highly Skilled
-0.4%
1.2%
1.67
0.10
0.50
Change in English Outcomes
Credit in English 1
English Course Failure
English grades (4 pt.)
35.8%
4.1%
1.15
-0.61
28.2%
4.0%
1.46
-0.11
-0.64
11.7%
2.1%
2.11
-0.06
-0.54
High Skilled
-3.2%
2.6%
1.70
-1.11

13. Graduation rates declined with the policy
Percent of students graduating from high school in 5 years
Policy Year
All students

14. Controlling for student background
High school graduates were less likely to go to college with the policy
Percent of graduates in each cohort attending a 4-year college after graduation
Controlling for student background
Policy
So, in the end, requiring more rigorous coursework led more students to fail and reduced the capacity of schools to prepare the highest-achieving students.

15. Other policies to improve academic rigor in Chicago had further unexpected results
Investment in curricular quality through IDS
Better professional development, pedagogy
Classes became less orderly
Test scores declined, grades remained the same
Double Dose Algebra
More challenging algebra instruction for both high- and low-skill students
Higher test scores among high- and low-skilled students
LOWER pass rates & grades among high-skill students

16. Why didn’t student outcomes improve with higher curricular challenge?

17. Student achievement is affected by the interplay of three instructional elements:
Academic challenge
Demands, quantity of work, critical thinking in assignments, teacher expectations
Classroom control
Student behavior, orderliness, participation, work completion
Student support
Monitoring & feedback, individualized assistance, instructional clarity
Student support is not personal support, but academic support.
By better understanding the ways in which elements of classroom instruction affect outcomes, these policy effects make perfect sense.
Classroom instruction measured from student surveys and student interviews, tied to grades and test scores. Statistical models controlled for student and teacher backgrounds and classroom characteristics. From Setting the Stage for Academic Rigor (To be released in Fall, 2013)

18. Orderly student behavior (classroom control) is a pre-requisite for academic challenge to lead to high learning gains

19. Higher challenge leads to lower grades, unless accompanied by support

20. When students encounter challenges, they withdraw
A: [Math] got complicated and I didn’t get it. I just felt like I couldn’t do it.
Q: What did you do?
A: Nothing. Just sat there.
The [homework] was too hard. I don’t understand it so I might as well not do it if I don’t understand something.
From Student Interviews

21. What needs to happen to improve student test scores?
Challenging work in a controlled environment – where students are doing what is expected
More challenging work requires students to work harder
But, classroom control can decline with increased challenge
Teachers need strategies around motivating students
Students may need explicit learning strategies to handle the work
If expanding challenging coursework changes the composition of high-level classes–-need strategies to keep the classroom controlled and challenging
When students talk about their best classes—AP, etc. they talk about how it made them work hard. How to be learners.
Teachers need to teach students that more is expected in terms of studying, teach how to do more student-centered work, model studying behaviors.
The teachers who do this are teachers who work hard. Who are attuned to their students. Who give them the academic help they need.

22. What needs to happen to improve student grades?
Good grades require support that meets the level of challenge
If monitoring & support don’t increase with higher challenge, grades fall and failures increase – even if students learn more
Example: Double-dose algebra. Students learned more, but failure rates increased.
The more that is asked of students, the more that teachers need to be sure they reach out as soon as a student is struggling
Students withdraw when they feel frustrated
The more challenging the material, the more important it is to have clear explanations of material
School climate – orderly and supportive.

23. Theme #2 Improvements in educational attainment require higher course grades (GPAs)… …more so than higher test scores
Grades in 9th grade are more predictive of high school graduation than entering achievement test scores, background characteristics
High School GPA matters much more than test scores for college graduation
Growing gaps in GPAs by race/ethnicity and gender are more of a concern than the gaps in test scores
1/17/2019

24. Who will graduate and who will drop out?
Indicator of Future Graduation/Dropout…
Prediction
of graduates in 4 years
Prediction of
non-graduates
Eighth grade test scores
Race
Economic status
Gender
Mobility prior to high school Over-age for grade
65%
correctly identified,
using all background information
48%
This one indicator gives a vastly better prediction than all of these background characteristics combined.

25. Who will graduate and who will drop out?
Indicator of Future Graduation/Dropout…
Prediction
of graduates in 4 years
Prediction of
non-graduates
Eighth grade test scores
Race
Economic status
Gender
Mobility prior to high school Over-age for grade
65%
correctly identified,
using all background information
48%
On-track in 9th grade
At least 5 credits, no more than 1 semester F
80%
using only the
on-track indicator
72%
This one indicator gives a vastly better prediction than all of these background characteristics combined.

26. Who will graduate and who will drop out?
Indicator of Future Graduation/Dropout…
Prediction
of graduates in 4 years
Prediction of
non-graduates
Eighth grade test scores
Race
Economic status
Gender
Mobility prior to high school Over-age for grade
65%
correctly identified,
using all background information
48%
On-track in 9th grade
80%
72%
On-track in 9th grade PLUS ALL Background characteristics
81%
This one indicator gives a vastly better prediction than all of these background characteristics combined.

27. Middle grade GPAs are better indicators of readiness to do well in high school than middle school test scores
Percent of Students Passing 9th Grade Math by 8th Grade Core GPA and 8th Grade Math ISAT Score
Ninth grade pass rates show no relationship with test scores, once we account for both incoming GPAs and attendance
Once I control for 8th grade attendance, test scores don’t matter at all.

28. High school GPAs are better indicators of likelihood to graduate college than high school test scores
6-year Graduation rates for North Carolina State Colleges by SAT Score and High School GPA (Bowen, Chingos & McPherson, 2011)
They find, like we find, that students need at least a B-average in high school to have a chance of graduating from college.
From Crossing the Finish Line (Bowen, Chingos, McPherson, 2011). Data is from state colleges in North Carolina

29. Gaps in students’ GPAs by gender and race/ethnicity drive gaps in college degree completion
So what matters for students’ grades?
NAEP Transcript study (2011)

30. Theme 3: Students’ grades (GPAs) depend on much more than their core academic knowledge and skills… They are affected by a host of “non-cognitive” factors, including behaviors, mindsets, perseverance, learning strategies and social skills

31. Measured by TEST SCORES
What factors
contribute to grades?
Content Knowledge
Measured by TEST SCORES
Academic Skills
Noncognitive Factors
Measured by GRADES

32. What are noncognitive factors?
Anything not measured by cognitive tests (achievement or IQ tests)
Skills, behaviors, strategies, beliefs, attitudes
The stuff that isn’t content knowledge or core academic skills, but that matters for school performance

33. There is a large literature on… Skills, behaviors, strategies, beliefs, attitudes
Time Management Interests Conscientiousness Work ethic Self-Regulation Grit Motivation Persistence Self-Concept Tenacity Self-Efficacy Collaboration Teamwork Agreeableness Open-mindedness Flexibility Leadership Creativity Innovation Confidence Effort Enthusiasm Values Cooperation Communication Peer Interactions Professionalism Work Completion Attendance Goal-setting
"non-cog factors" go by many names… soft skills… same name used to mean different things in different fields, different names used for basically the same construct

34. 5 Categories of Noncognitive Factors
Academic Behaviors
Academic Perseverance
Academic Mindsets
Learning Strategies
Social Skills
Academic
Performance
(Course Grades)

35. Attendance, homework completion
Academic Behaviors
Being a “good student”
Only DIRECT relationship to course performance – All other factors are expressed through academic behaviors
Improving academic behaviors is the only way to substantially improve grades
Academic Behaviors
Going to class
Doing homework
Participating
Studying
Academic Performance
Clear evidence on
Attendance, homework completion
Monitoring & support

36. Academic Perseverance
Ability and tendency to see things through to completion despite distractions or obstacles
Expressed through the quality, intensity, and duration of a student’s academic behavior
State or trait?
A desirable outcome, but hard to change directly!
Academic Perseverance
Grit, Tenacity, Persistence,
Self-Control, Effort,
Delayed Gratification
Academic Behaviors
Academic Performance

37. Academic Mindsets Academic Mindsets
Beliefs about oneself in relation to academic work.
Sense of Belonging
Self-Efficacy
Growth Mindset
Relevance
Academic Mindsets
I belong in this academic community.
I can succeed at this.
My ability and competence grow with my effort.
This work has value to me.
Academic Perseverance
Academic Behaviors
Mindsets are really powerful because of recursive thought processes
Academic Performance

38. Evidence on Academic Mindsets
Foundational research vs. Intervention studies
Goal orientations
Implicit theories of ability
Locus of control
Expectancy-value theory
Learned helplessness
Stereotype threat
Normalizing academic difficulty in college
Malleability of intelligence
Relevance of course material
Cueing important values

39. Learning Strategies Learning Strategies Academic Behaviors
Strategies to aid in cognitive work of thinking, learning, or remembering
Academic Perseverance
Learning Strategies
Study Skills
Metacognitive Strategies
Self-Regulated Learning
Goal Setting
Academic Behaviors
Academic Performance

40. Interpersonal Skills, Empathy, Cooperation, Assertion, Responsibility
Social Skills
Poor social skills/ behaviors can negatively affect grades through disciplinary events
Little evidence of positive effects on grades from especially strong social skills, but important for other outcomes
Social Skills
Interpersonal Skills, Empathy, Cooperation, Assertion, Responsibility
Academic Behaviors
Academic Performance

41. Model of Noncognitive Factors

42. What does this mean for getting students engaged around more challenging curriculum?
Increased challenge can affect mindsets in negative ways (self-efficacy), as well as positive ways (relevance)
Higher challenge means students need to show more perseverance to meet new expectations
Higher challenge with different instructional tasks may require different learning strategies
Students can learn more because of exposure to harder material, but get lower grades, reducing future educational attainment
Directly, through lower GPAs
Indirectly, by affecting their mindsets about future work

43. Curricular approaches address skills, but not necessarily engagement with the curriculum
More challenging, college-oriented curriculum
Increased learning, Stronger skills
Higher educational attainment
For challenging curriculum to result in increased learning, students must be doing the work
For stronger skills to lead to higher educational attainment, students need good grades and positive mindsets

44. Teachers can be ready for the additional demands of more challenging curriculum
Systems for close monitoring and support around students’ academic behaviors
Poor attendance, work effort indicate problems with mindsets, lack of sufficient learning strategies, as well as other issues in students’ lives
Monitoring student behaviors and talking to students can help teachers diagnose problems
Individualized assistance to students who miss class or an assignment can keep students from falling too far behind
Attention to instructional clarity, individualized assistance in lessons
Helps students feel they can succeed, they do belong
Explicit teaching of learning strategies and behavioral expectations so that students can handle higher demands
Scaffold learning processes and academic behaviors, as a key part of teaching more challenging material (not in place of it)
These are teacher-based practices, but we can’t expect each individual teacher to be able to do this well on their own, especially if they are teaching many students with skills well below the level of the curriculum, or are in a difficult school context.

45. Schools can be ready for the additional demands of more challenging curriculum
School leadership can support teachers through systems and collaboration
Data systems that are easy to use to monitor students, that can allow information on student progress to be available across staff and with parents
School-wide mechanisms and policies that facilitate partnerships between teachers, students, parents
Time for collaboration and planning among teachers who share students
Schools can have supports in place for students with skills below course- level, or with prior low performance, before they fall behind
Can use data on prior performance to identify the types of support that they will likely need
School leadership should be strategic when planning programs and instruction, so that everyone’s efforts are aligned coherently to support student engagement in their classes