Education Week - September 17, 2014 - 5

the United States' future economic
competitiveness and the quality of
its schools.
In a report released last week, the
business school indicated that 47 percent
of its alumni expect a deterioration
in U.S. competitiveness over the
next three years, and they saw little
improvement in the K-12 education
system, which contributes to the
country's competitive position as it
prepares students who will enter the
workforce.
The alumni said they saw only
small signs of progress in the United
States' K-12 system -a modest level
of improvement that puts education
on par with the U.S. tax code, political
system, and regulatory policy-in
the respondents' views of how much
those areas have improved in the
same period.
-MICHELE MOLNAR
Mo. to Permit Weapons,
Ban Monitoring in Schools
The Missouri legislature last
week overrode two vetoes by Gov.
Jay Nixon of bills related to school
safety. The first bill will allow districts
to designate teachers or administrators
as "school protection
officers" authorized to carry concealed
firearms in schools.
School boards can meet in closed
session to designate employees as
school-protection officers. It's an approach
similar to Texas' school marshals
program, which was a part of a
series of guns-in-schools bills passed
by states following the 2012 shootings
at Sandy Hook Elementary
School in Newtown, Conn.
The Missouri bill also gives schoolprotection
officers the power to detain
and arrest suspects.
The second bill will bar schools
REPORT ROUNDUP www.edweek.org/go/rr
KINDERGARTEN ENTRY AGE
"Student Age and the Collegiate Pathway"
Children who are among the oldest in
their kindergarten class are more likely
than younger classmates to take and pass
Advanced Placement exams in high school
and to earn bachelor's degrees within four
years, according to a study by researchers at
the College Board, the New York City-based
nonprofit that administers the SAT and Advanced
Placement exams.
The study, published online in July, will
appear in a forthcoming issue of the Journal
of Policy Analysis and Management. Researchers
zeroed in on children in the same
kindergarten cohort who were born up to
364 days apart. They tracked 1.6 million
students who entered kindergarten between
1991 and 1995.
The study found that the younger students
caught up with their older peers six years
after high school graduation when both
groups were earning bachelor's degrees at
about the same rates.
DISTRICT LEADERSHIP
"School Superintendents: Vital or Irrelevant?"
Superintendents have very little influence
on student achievement in their districts, a
report suggests.
The Brown Center on Education Policy
at the Brookings Institution examined the
role of superintendents in Florida and North
Carolina, using student-level administrative
data from the 2000-01 to 2009-10 school
years.
The study found that hiring a new superintendent
has little or no meaningful impact
on student achievement, nor is there any association
with superintendent turnover and
improvements in student test scores.
It analyzed a decade's worth of 4th and
5th grade mathematics test scores in North
Carolina, and found that superintendents
accounted for only 0.3 percent of student
differences in achievement-a statistically
significant but small effect.
-MADELINE WILL
SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL LEARNING
"Growth Trajectories of Early Aggression,
Overactivity, and Inattention: Relations to 2nd
Grade Reading"
Inattentive toddlers are at a higher risk of
developing reading problems in 2nd grade,
according to a study published this month in
the journal Developmental Psychology.
Researchers asked the parents of 1,329
children ages 1 to 3 to report whether their
toddlers showed hyperactive, inattentive, or
aggressive behaviors. When the children entered
2nd grade, the researchers conducted
in-person interviews with 541 of the children,
and conducted Woodcock-Johnson reading
tests on 359 of them.
-HOLLY YETTICK
Students overall showed fewer of all of
the negative behaviors as they got older, but
those who were rated highly for inattention
in their early years were significantly more
likely to perform lower on reading tests in
school. The results suggest early interventions
focused on inattention could benefit
reading development.
-SARAH D. SPARKS
PHYSICAL EDUCATION
"Associations of Physical Activity and
Sedentary Behavior With Academic Skills"
Physically active boys perform better in
early reading in lower primary school than
more sedentary boys, according to a Finnish
study published in the journal PLOS-One.
Researchers tracked the activities at recess
and before and after school of Finnish students
in grades 1-3. Boys with higher levels
of recess activity and those who walked or
bicycled to and from school had better reading
fluency than less active boys.
For girls, results were more mixed. Higher
overall physical activity was associated with
better reading fluency and arithmetic skills
among 1st through 3rd grade girls of parents
with a university degree, but the reverse was
true of girls with less educated parents. -S.D.S.
MATHEMATICS EDUCATION
"Using Assessment Data to Guide Math Course
Placement of California Middle School
Students"
Better mathematics screening procedures
may help schools choose students for 8th
grade Algebra 1 classes who will be able to
successfully complete the course, according
to a study by the Regional Educational Laboratory
West.
Researchers from the laboratory, known as
WestEd, worked with eight districts whose
schools typically use math proficiency on
the 6th grade California Standards Test
to place students in middle school algebra.
However, students who meet the proficiency
cutoff-350 out of 650 points-have only a
40 percent chance of successfully completing
8th grade algebra. Those who score 17 points
or more above proficiency have a 50 percent
chance of succeeding.
Researchers found, however, that students'
scores on a second test-the Mathematics
Diagnostic Testing Project's 7th grade test
of algebra readiness-boosted the success
rate of those class placements to a range of
69 percent to 78 percent. Typically, those test
results are available only after placement
decisions are already made.
-S.D.S.
EDUCATION WEEK | September 17, 2014 | www.edweek.org | 5
Survey: Students' Mobile-Device Use Rising
"Pearson Student Mobile Device Survey 2014"
A growing number of U.S. students regularly use laptops, tablets, and smartphones
for schoolwork, but just one in six attends a school that provides all students with
their own such mobile devices.
The results are part of a newly released study from Pearson, an education publisher
headquartered in London and New York. The study is based on a survey of 2,252 public,
private, and home-schooled students in grades 5-12 in February and March 2013.
The survey shows divergent trends in the types of devices favored by elementary,
middle, and high school students. Younger students use tablets more often than
older ones: Nearly two-thirds of elementary students use such a device regularly,
compared with 42 percent of high school students, who are more likely to own and
use smartphones.
Eighty-six percent of high school students use a laptop, notebook, or Chromebook
at least a few times per month for schoolwork, compared with 77 percent of middle
school students and 72 percent of elementary students. Sixty-two percent of high
school students use smartphones for schoolwork at least a few times per month, compared
with 40 percent of middle school students and 28 percent of those in elementary
school. Two-thirds of students use a laptop/notebook/Chromebook, smartphone,
or tablet in school daily.
But the most common venue for such technology usage remains the computer lab,
followed closely by shared in-class sets of devices-especially so for elementary students,
74 percent of whom said that is how they access school devices. -BENJAMIN HEROLD
from using "radio-frequency identification
technology" to monitor or
track the location of students.
Gov. Nixon, a Democrat, had said
that local officials are in the best
position to make decisions on such
devices. He said they could be used
as a public safety tool to locate students
during emergency situations
or natural disasters.
-E.B
Indianapolis Prohibits
Food Rewards for Students
A new wellness guideline in one
of Indiana's largest districts bars
Idlewild
Elementary
School Principal
Randy Thompson
pours ice water
over Dorsey
Hopson, the
superintendent
of the Shelby
County district,
in Memphis,
Tenn., as they
participate in
the ALS Ice
Bucket
Challenge.
$75,000 to settle allegations that
the district failed to take appropriate
steps to end years of race-based
bullying.
The girl, who is black, attended
Franklin Township's Main Road
School in Gloucester County
from 2005 to 2009. She claimed
students called her race-based
names and made bias-driven
comments.
The district denied it engaged in
teachers from rewarding student
achievements with food.
The policy approved by the Indianapolis
district over the summer is
designed to create a healthier environment
for students.
It says that instead of pizza parties,
students might be rewarded with
sports equipment for recess and board
games for parties.
-ASSOCIATED PRESS
N.J. District Settles Case
Of Race-Based Bullying
A southern New Jersey district
has agreed to pay a student
unlawful discrimination and said
that its administrators acted on the
student's allegations.
However, New Jersey's civil rights
division in 2011 issued a finding
of probable cause against the school.
-AP
CORRECTION:
An article on unionized charter
schools in the Sept. 10, 2014,
issue of Education Week misspelled
the names of the Nea Community
Learning Center in Alameda,
Calif., and of Cristina G. de Jesus,
the president of Green Dot charter
schools and the CEO of its California
schools.
Brad Vest/The Commercial Appeal/AP

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Education Week - September 17, 2014

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