Career Academies show no discernible effects on progressing in school: academy students accrued no more course credits than comparison students by the end of twelfth grade (effect size 0.09, not statistically significant or substantively important).¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · causal r2 · q3 · i0 negligible
Currency · newest study 2015 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q3 i0 Students enrolled in Career Academies accrued no more credits than similar comparison group students by the end of the twelfth-grade year; the WWC-calculated effect size of 0.09 was neither statistically significant nor substantively important. → progressing-1

Evidence¶

progressing-1¶

U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, What Works Clearinghouse. (2015, September). Dropout Prevention intervention report: Career Academies. Retrieved from https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/InterventionReport/70

q3 · i0 · causal · r2

The WWC review reports the progressing in school domain finding from the Kemple & Snipes (2000) randomized controlled trial, with 1,379 students in nine schools. Total course credits were 22.3 (SD 5.6) for the intervention group versus 21.8 (SD 5.5) for the comparison group; the effect size of 0.09 (improvement index +4, p = .08) was not statistically significant or substantively important.

"Kemple and Snipes (2000) reported that students enrolled in Career Academies accrued no more credits than similar comparison group students by the end of the twelfth-grade year. The WWC-calculated effect size of 0.09 was not statistically significant or substantively important."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Career Academies show no discernible effects on staying in school: about 10% of academy students dropped out before the end of grade 12 versus about 12% of comparison students (effect size 0.14, not statistically significant or substantively important). — related
• Career Academies have potentially positive effects on completing school: about 96% of academy students earned a diploma or GED within 8 years of expected graduation versus about 94% of comparison students (effect size 0.27, not statistically significant but substantively important). — related
• The evidence base for Career Academies in dropout prevention rests on a single randomized controlled trial in which students were randomly assigned to academy enrollment, a waitlist, or a comparison group across nine sites. — related
• Lied magnet students in grades 6-8 attempted and completed significantly more STEM credits than matched comparison students — related
• Check & Connect increases credits accrued (progressing in school) in one RCT — related
• MDRC's experimental career academies evaluation found males earned as much as 17% more than peers for 8 years after high school, alongside attendance, course-taking, and on-time-credit gains — reports the opposite