The Longitudinal Effects of School Improvement Grants

School Improvement Grants (SIGs) exemplify a capacity-building investment to spur sustainable changes in America’s persistently lowest-performing schools and stimulate the economy. This study examines both short- and longer-term effects of the first two cohorts of SIG schools from four locations across the country. Dynamic difference-in-differences models show that SIGs’ effects on achievement in Grades 3 to 8, as measured by state test scores in math and English language arts, gradually increased over the three reform years and were largely sustained for 3 or 4 years afterward. Evidence on high school graduation rates, though less robust, also suggests SIGs had positive effects. SIGs’ effects on students of color and low-socioeconomic-status students were similar to or significantly larger than the overall effects.

School Turnaround: A Rural Reflection of Reform on the Reservation and Lessons for Implementation

Rural communities traditionally enjoy an intimate relationship between stakeholders and the local school system. While preliminary research exists to suggest rural school turnaround might be more likely to occur when a strong communal connection exists (Mette, 2014), little is known about rural school turnaround efforts serving predominantly Native American students. This article reports findings of a School Improvement Grants (SIG) funded effort to digitize curriculum and deliver instruction through the use of tablets in Yellow Pine, a school district on a Native American reservation in a rural, Upper Midwestern state. Data were collected through interviews with school and district leaders, as well as through teacher focus groups. Findings highlight the failure to engage a historically disenfranchised community from the beginning of the improvement process, particularly the lack of involvement of students, parents, and teachers, which in turn led to little impact on student achievement.

School Improvement Grants in Ohio: Effects on Student Achievement and School Administration

The federal School Improvement Grant (SIG) program allocated US$7 billion over nearly a decade in an effort to produce rapid and lasting improvements in schools identified as low performing. In this article, we use a regression discontinuity design to estimate the effect of Ohio’s SIG turnaround efforts on student achievement and school administration. The results indicate that Ohio’s SIG program significantly increased reading and math achievement, with effects in both subjects of up to 0.20 standard deviations in the second year after SIG eligibility identification. Estimates for the third year are somewhat larger, in the range of one quarter of a standard deviation. We provide evidence that these effects were primarily attributable to schools that implemented the SIG Turnaround model. We also show that SIG eligibility had a positive effect on per-pupil spending, but no average effect on administrative outcomes, including staff turnover, the number of staff members in the school, and school closure. These null overall effects mask heterogeneity across SIG models, however. Most notably, Turnaround schools experienced more turnover than they otherwise would have, whereas Transformation schools experienced less.

Resource- and Approach-Driven Multidimensional Change: Three-Year Effects of School Improvement Grants

Hoping to spur dramatic school turnaround, the federal government channeled resources to the country’s lowest-performing schools through School Improvement Grants (SIG). However, prior research on SIG effectiveness is limited and focuses primarily on student achievement. This study uses a difference-in-differences strategy to estimate program impacts on multiple dimensions across the 3-year duration of the SIG award in one urban school district. Following 2 years of modest improvement, we find pronounced, positive effects of SIG interventions on student achievement in Year 3, consistent with prior literature indicating that improvements from comprehensive school turnarounds emerge gradually. We also identify improvements indicating the process through which change occurred, including reduced unexcused absences, increased family preference for SIG schools, improved retention of effective teachers, and greater development of teacher professional capacity.