Small Works in Nebraska: How Poverty and the Size of School Systems Affect School Performance in Nebraska


Last Updated: January 01, 2004
 

Small Works in Nebraska

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By Jerry Johnson

New Research Findings

New research shows that Nebraska’s smaller school systems reduce the harmful effects of poverty on student achievement.

Background

A series of studies in eight states (Alaska, Arkansas, California, Georgia, Montana, Ohio, Texas, and West Virginia) indicates that smaller schools and districts reduce the harmful effects of poverty on student achievement and help narrow the achievement gap between students from less affluent communities and students from wealthier communities (Bickel & Howley 2000, Friedkin & Necochea 1988, Howley 1996, Howley and Bickel 1999, Huang & Howley 1993, and Johnson, Howley, & Howley 2002). The implication is that the less affluent a community, the smaller the school and district serving the community should be in order to maximize student achievement. The current study applies the same research model to Nebraska, and yields findings that are consistent with those from other states.

The Nebraska findings are:

1. Poverty has a substantial negative effect over student achievement in Nebraska’s larger systems but little or no power over achievement in Nebraska’s smaller systems.

2. Across all levels of poverty and affluence, increased system size results in decreased academic achievement at critical grade levels.

Research Design

This study followed the same research models used in the earlier studies to measure how achievement levels relate to school system size and student poverty.

The analysis looked for two kinds of effects:

The Excellence Effect of size – Does a school system’s size influence its students’ performance differently depending on the level of poverty in the communities from which the students come? Regression analysis is used to demonstrate how the average achievement scores of school systems vary with changes in size and changes in the level of poverty. Results from this analysis allow us to answer some important questions about the effects of size and poverty on achievement.

1. First, we want to know if the level of academic achievement depends on the level of poverty among students in the school system.

2. Second, we want to know if the level of academic achievement depends on the size of the school system.

3. Third, we want to know if the level of academic achievement depends on the interaction between these two variables. That is, do school system size and student poverty compound each other, multiplying any effect they might have separately, and does the effect of the system size on achievement depend on the level of poverty among the students?

With answers to these questions, we can effectively describe the relationships between achievement, poverty, and size. We call these relationships “excellence effects” because they illustrate the size conditions that offer the maximum potential for increasing academic achievement. Put another way, the analysis measures how the absolute level of performance on tests varies with changes in size and poverty, and demonstrates how the size variable can be used to maximize student achievement.

The Equity Effect – Is poverty’s power over student achievement greater in smaller or larger systems? Correlation analysis is used to measure the strength of the negative relationship between poverty level and test scores in larger or smaller school systems. Where the relationship is stronger, poverty has more power in determining achievement outcomes, and the achievement gap between rich and poor is broader; where the relationship is weaker, poverty has less power over achievement, and the gap between rich and poor is narrowed. We call these relationships “equity effects” because they describe what size school systems offer more equitable distributions of achievement (that is, where wealthy and affluent alike share in high achievement), and whether the achievement gap between wealthier and poorer groups of students is relatively broader in larger or smaller school systems.

The excellence effect tells us something about the absolute level of student achievement in relationship to poverty and size. The equity effect tells us something about how much influence poverty has over achievement in smaller versus larger systems.

For this research, the unit of analysis is the system, not the individual student. This is appropriate in today’s policy environment because teachers, administrators, and leaders are increasingly held accountable for the aggregate performance of their students, and because there is a proposal currently under discussion in Nebraska to encourage or induce consolidation of systems with fewer than 390 students.

The research included all districts that were operational in the school year 2001-2002, a total of 754. To achieve the desired system level data, Class I district information was distributed to their affiliate Class II, III, IV, V, or VI district following procedures established by the Nebraska Department of Education for the purpose of calculating state aid. This resulted in a total of 263 systems for analysis. All data used in this study are provided by the Nebraska Department of Education and are available to the general public.