On-track improvements were accompanied by across-the-board grade gains, not grade inflation from turning Fs into Ds¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · causal r1 · q2
Currency · newest study 2014 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q2 i? In the 17 secondary-mover schools, the share of freshmen with Ds or Fs declined from 33 to 22 percent while the share with Bs or better rose from 28 to 37 percent. → Roderick 2014

Evidence¶

Roderick 2014¶

Roderick, M., Kelley-Kemple, T., Johnson, D.W., and Beechum, N.O. (2014). Preventable Failure: Improvements in Long-Term Outcomes when High Schools Focused on the Ninth Grade Year. UChicago CCSR Research Summary. https://consortium.uchicago.edu/publications/preventable-failure-improvements-long-term-outcomes-when-high-schools-focused-ninth

q2 · i? · causal · r1

Grade-distribution analysis in the 17 secondary-mover schools. The summary reports Ds/Fs "declined significantly, from 33 to 22 percent" and Bs-or-better rose from 28 to 37 percent, with a 10-point rise in Bs-or-better and 12-point rise in students with no Fs.

"The portion of students with D's or F's declined significantly, from 33 to 22 percent, while the percentage of students with B's or better increased from 28 to 37 percent. Thus, there is little evidence, on average, that the increase in on-track rates in these schools was driven by simply focusing on turning F's into D's"

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• The rise in diploma earning came from declining dropout rates, which fell from 35 to 11 percent, not from declines in other outcomes — related
• Gains in sophomore performance were unequal: about one in five Latino and Black young men were off-track at the end of sophomore year — related
• Freshman OnTrack remains a strong predictor of high school graduation even as on-track rates have risen — related
• Three freshman warning indicators—off-track status, any course failure, and attendance below 85 percent—identify 70 percent of eventual non-graduates — related
• Grade inflation has not significantly attenuated the signaling power of grades, with some evidence of an increase (Pattison, Grodsky, and Muller, attributed)
• High school course grades improved in spring 2020 and remained higher than pre-pandemic levels through spring 2021, with a slight rise in Fs — related
• Higher course grades predict larger ACT gains regardless of starting PLAN score; students with Ds or Fs lose ground — related
• Student performance declines from freshman to sophomore year, with course failures rising in every subject and attendance declining sharply — reports the opposite