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Elementary schools
Teacher-student relationships and adult outcomes: Developmental cascades via childhood executive function and behavioral dysregulation
Longitudinal data were examined to test associations between teacher-student relationships and adult outcomes, as well as mechanisms underlying these associations. Results from the NICHD-SECCYD (N=1364; 52% male; 76% White; 13% Black; 6% Hispanic; 5% other; data collection took place in the U.S… more →
Not Too Young to Notice: The Early Emergence of Racial Disparities in Elementary Students’ School Climate Perceptions
Topics: Student Well-BeingScholarship on school climate often fails to explore the perspectives of elementary-school students. To fill this gap, we use survey-data from Georgia to examine racial disparities in elementary-school students’ school climate perceptions, how they vary over time, and the factors that associate… more →
Using experimental variation to examine the (co-)development of cognitive and social-emotional skills in early childhood
Topics: MethodsTags: Child development, Early childhood education, Elementary schools, Returns to education and skillsQuestions about the stability of psychological constructs, skill generalization, and transfer have long motivated psychological research. Despite a proliferation of theory, the field has rarely established causal effects. We employed a novel approach to test the stability and codevelopment of… more →
Childhood Interventions and Life Course Development
Topics: Policy, Politics, and GovernanceTags: Early childhood education, Elementary schools, High schools, Human capital, Returns to education and skillsA paradox has perplexed researchers studying childhood interventions: although program impacts on children’s skills often fade, some interventions have nonetheless produced long-run impacts on adult outcomes. Existing developmental theory does not provide a straightforward explanation. The… more →
Beyond the Classroom: Impact of a High-Dosage Tutoring Program on Student Literacy Achievement
Topics: Student LearningThis study examines the impact of a high-dosage tutoring program, characterized by low tutor-to-student-ratio, on the literacy achievement of students in grades two through five in a midsized suburban school district in the southeastern United States. Using a student-level randomized controlled… more →
COVID-19-Induced School Closures and Disadvantaged Children’s Post-COVID Academic Growth: A Longitudinal Cohort Study
Topics: Student LearningThis study draws on unique, repeated-measures data on a diverse (51% female; 53% Latine, 22% Black, 11% White), low-income cohort of children (N = 680) whose academic skills were assessed before and after COVID-19-induced school closures. Longitudinal models predicted changes in children’s… more →
Creating Classes: Elementary school classroom assignments and their implications for student access to high-quality teaching
We investigate the distribution of students across classrooms in North Carolina elementary schools. While tracking is ubiquitous and well-documented in secondary education, limited evidence exists regarding cross-classroom clustering in elementary schools and its consequences. Consistent with… more →
Influence of Within-Class Age Differences on Adolescents’ Eating Behaviors
Topics: Student Well-BeingThis study examines within-class age differences as a novel determinant of adolescents’ dietary behaviors, isolating it from confounders such as absolute age, season of birth, and country-specific school entry rules. Using a multi-country dataset of over 600,000 European students, we find that… more →
What is the impact of changing schools on the academic outcomes of elementary and middle school students?
Topics: Student LearningWe study how different kinds of school changes shape achievement in grades 4–8 using data from six California districts (2016–17 through 2019–20). We estimate the effects of structural (promotional), nonstructural summer, and midyear moves and find that structural and summer moves have near-zero… more →
Gender Gaps in the Early Grades: Questioning the Narrative that Schools are Poorly Suited to Young Boys
Topics: Student LearningA growing number of scholars and educational leaders have raised concerns that the mismatch between an increasingly academic focus in the early grades and boys’ maturity at school entry is disadvantaging young boys in school. In this study, we use a unique dataset of ten million students to… more →
Measuring Elementary School Teachers' Knowledge of Teaching Vocabulary
Topics: Teacher and Leader DevelopmentTeacher Knowledge in the field of literacy has become a priority across the United States, with many states passing legislation requiring that all teachers receive adequate training on the Science of Reading. One essential component of literacy development and text comprehension is vocabulary… more →
Does Civic Education Impact Primary-School Students’ Civic Outcomes? Experimental Evidence from Liberia
Topics: Student LearningWe present experimental evidence on a civic education program in Liberia's public primary schools across 140 schools serving grades 3 and 4. The program provided new civic textbooks, teacher training, bi-weekly instruction, and regular classroom monitoring. After one school year, treatment… more →
The Extent of Student Mobility Among Vulnerable Groups in California
Nonstructural student mobility—school changes not tied to grade-level promotion—is common and consequential yet remains underexamined in recent research. This paper analyzes the incidence, disparities, and predictors of nonstructural school mobility using longitudinal data from six… more →
Teaching Practices and the Persistence of School-Entry Age Effects
Topics: Student LearningWe consider the effect of teaching practices on the persistence of school-entry age effects caused by rigid cutoff dates for school eligibility in Spain. We document significant school-entry age effects for the same cohort of students when they were in elementary and secondary school. Then, we… more →
Separation of Church and State Curricula? Examining Public and Religious Private School Textbooks
Tags: Belonging, Culturally responsive schooling, Curriculum, Elementary schools, Human capital, Instructional design, Instructional practices, Instructional technology, Race, ethnicity, and education, Reading and literacy education, Science education, Social studies educationCurricula impart knowledge, instill values, and shape collective memory. Despite growing public funding for religious schools through U.S. school choice programs, little is known about what they teach. We examine textbooks from public schools, religious private schools, and home schools,… more →
The Impacts of Grade Retention Policy With Minimal Retention
Topics: Student LearningState laws that mandate in-grade retention for struggling readers are widespread in the U.S., covering 34% of public-school third graders in 2023-24. This study investigates the impacts of Michigan’s third-grade reading law on subsequent test scores and school progress outcomes for the 2020-21… more →
Does School Context Moderate the Relationship between Student Mobility and Academic Performance? Longitudinal Evidence from Missouri
Topics: Student LearningStudent mobility is highly prevalent in the United States and has negative impacts on students’ academic performance. Within-year mobility may be especially disruptive. However, research on the impacts of within-year mobility is limited, and less is known how impacts may vary across different… more →
How Does Early Achievement Predict Within-Year Student Mobility? Longitudinal Evidence from Missouri
Topics: Student LearningStudent mobility that occurs within a school year may be especially disruptive for student outcomes, yet little is known regarding the predictors of within-year mobility. In particular, research has yet to comprehensively examine the role of student achievement in predicting within-year student… more →
Count Me In? Identifying Factors That Predict Centers’ Application to Boston’s Mixed-Delivery Universal Pre-K Program
Topics: MethodsUniversal prekindergarten (UPK) programs often expand through mixed-delivery systems by offering seats in public schools and community-based centers (CBOs). Although this approach aims to meet varied family needs, little is known about potential systematic differences between CBOs that apply to… more →
The Peer Effects of Grade Retention
Topics: Policy, Politics, and GovernanceWe study the peer effects of grade retention in the context of Indiana’s statewide third-grade retention policy. When a retention occurs, it changes the peer group for two cohorts: rising fourth graders who lose a peer and rising third graders who gain a peer. We identify peer effects in both… more →