Carl Cohn
We all enjoyed the popular 1980s TV series in which the fictional and lovable middle-schooler Kevin Arnold chronicled the many social and psychological challenges of growing up in the turbulent era of the 1960s.
Like all shows that resonate with popular culture, “The Wonder Years” suggested that the middle-school years are about important rites of social passage that have to do with friendships, first love and self-discovery.
A groundbreaking new study conducted by researchers at EdSource, Stanford University and American Institutes for Research – “Gaining Ground in the Middle Grades” – suggests that those middle years are about much more. For students, the middle grades are a crucial time to gain knowledge and skills needed to enter high school prepared for a college and a career-ready path. The middle grades are the last, best chance to identify students at risk of academic failure and get them back on track in time to succeed in high school.
California school districts have experimented with many ways to organize middle grades. They have opened K-8 schools, grade-7-8 schools and others that run from grades 5 or 6 through grade 8. Many have worked to bolster their focus on “academic rigor” and to ensure that students are engaged in school while they go through the changes of puberty. Educators have argued for these and other approaches based primarily on theories about early adolescent developmental needs. That’s because research or hard evidence about what practices actually affect academic outcomes have not existed.
Until now. The EdSource study systematically analyzed which district and school policies and practices are linked to higher student performance. The researchers surveyed nearly 4,000 California teachers, principals and superintendents about a wide range of middle-grades practices. The 303 schools in the study were from up and down California. The schools were in 195 districts plus six charter management organizations.
The responses were then analyzed against outcomes of 204,000 students on 2009 California Standards Tests in English-language arts and math. The report, perhaps the most comprehensive ever conducted on these critical grades, tells us exactly what is working in California to improve student performance in the middle grades while also dispelling prevalent myths.
The study shows that what matters most in middle school performance is not where a student goes to school or parents’ income, but what happens in the school. Districts and schools with practices that reflect an intense focus on improving middle-grade student outcomes are higher-performing, whether they serve primarily low-income students or primarily middle-income students.
The report indicates that a focus on academic rigor can’t wait until high school, when students wake up to the demands of California’s exit exams. Middle schools that are most effective provide an all-out focus on academics as soon as students enroll. They know which entering students have what kinds of academic challenges and establish individual plans to get struggling students back on track. They monitor the progress of each child and intervene whenever students fall behind. They communicate with parents about the need to be involved and with students about why success in the middle grades is important. Districts hold superintendents, principals and teachers accountable for results through evaluations that focus in part on student outcomes.
What the study did not show was any correlation between grade configuration or organization of teaching and instruction with higher student performance. There may be other good reasons for a district to make particular choices on these issues, but improvements in student outcomes is not one of them. It’s time to refocus the discussion.
The major contribution of this study is that it provides a comprehensive set of actionable, inter- related practices that improve middle-grade student outcomes. Parents can use the study’s information to make sure that the effective practices identified in this report are everyday practices in their child’s school. Parents, educators and policymakers can press to make sure middle grades have their priorities straight and are focused on providing a full-court academic press to help all children achieve.
The findings also tell us to make improved student performance a priority when we evaluate adults.
Most importantly, the study’s findings give middle-grade educators and parents in low-income communities hope. School practice can trump family background when it comes to what makes education in the middle grades work to set students on the path to success. The middle-grade years are phenomenally important.
There is no reason the so-called “wonder years” should be throwaway years for California students.
Reed Hastings
