Multiple factors influence a student's success in high school graduation. Individual factors such as disability, racial or ethnic identity, and gender may result in inequity in the school environment, interfering with learning and possibly leading to poorer educational outcomes. This secondary analysis of student educational records (N = 3,782)…

Though schools do not track in Brazil, I find that racial classroom segregation in Brazil is on par with recent estimates from North Carolina high schools (Clotfelter et al., 2020). How does racial classroom segregation occur without tracking, and in a supposed "racial paradise," no less? Using national, student-level data spanning from…

This study is a language policy ethnography of the families of four Latina fifth-grade students at a TWBE elementary school as they transition to middle school. Parents and their children jointly acted as policy agents as they navigated the school district's open enrollment system and, through their choices, co-created policy. Situated within…

A growing body of research shows that students benefit when they demographically match their teachers. However, little is known about how matching affects social-emotional development. We use student-fixed effects to exploit changes over time in the proportion of teachers within a school grade who demographically match a student to estimate…

Despite growing calls for greater inclusivity and cultural responsiveness, little is known about how environmental education (EE) may differentially affect diverse audiences. As part of a national study of 334 environmentally focused day field trips for adolescent youth in the United States in 2018, we examined how outcomes differed for students…

Supporting student wellbeing in schools is increasingly becoming a global priority. However, research and initiatives primarily focus on general wellbeing rather than subject-specific experiences. Given the pervasive levels of mathematics anxiety, negative attitudes, and disengagement in mathematics education, we argue for a more contextualised…

Middle school is an important crossroad in a student's academic journey. As students enter middle school, their academic achievement and engagement frequently declines. This is true particularly for Black and Latinx students. Poor middle school grades are often a harbinger of poor performance in high school and beyond. In particular, having a…

The "Academic Mindsets and Behaviors, Prior Achievement, and the Transition to Middle School" study examined the relationship between 2016/17 grade 5 student responses to a Clark County School District (Nevada) survey on levels of academic mindsets and behaviors and the predicted probability of earning a low GPA (below 2.0) at the end of…

This Study Snapshot highlights key findings from a study on why students often experience a decline in academic achievement as they transition to middle school. Academic mindsets, such as a belief in the malleability of ability (growth mindset) or a reluctance to engage academically because of embarrassment or a fear of failure (performance…

This study examined bullying and cyberbullying among 185 middle school students in 4 urban middle schools in Ohio. Nearly 60% of the sample was female, and 67% of the sample was not Caucasian. The results indicated that bullying and cyberbullying are prevalent in this population. Approximately 44% of 6th-grade students felt terrible about…

We examined to what extent subgroups of students identified with learning disabilities (LDs; N = 630) in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 1998 to 1999 (ECLS-K): 1998 national longitudinal study displayed heterogeneity in longitudinal profiles of reading and mathematics achievement from first to eighth grades.…

Providing instruction in multiple languages has the potential to simultaneously help both native English speakers and English learners to develop language proficiency. "Dual language programs" can help native English speakers develop proficiency in a second language and English learners develop proficiency in both their native language…

The purpose of this study is to investigate the progress being made to close the current achievement gap in Kentucky. Guiding the study is the following research question: Which districts are closing racial and socioeconomic achievement gaps at rates that exceed expectations? The authors assess districts' progress in closing racial and…

This research brief examines the continuing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on student achievement and progress toward academic recovery. Using data from 6.7 million U.S. public school students currently in grades 3-8, the study examined academic gains in the 2022-23 school year relative to pre-pandemic years. It also tracked the gap in…

We examined developmental changes in self-esteem from late childhood to late adolescence in African American girls (N = 124), comparing skin tone groups. Girls completed a measure of self-esteem when they were in Grades 5, 7, 10, and 12, and in Grade 12 their skin tone was rated on a 3-point scale (1 = "Light," 2 = "Medium," 3…