Addressing the educational needs of students in math early on is critical given that early gaps in math skills widen further over the course of schooling. This study examines the effectiveness and costs of Kentucky’s Math Achievement Fund—a unique state-level program that combines targeted interventions, peer-coaching, and close collaboration among teachers to improve math achievement in grades K–3. The program is found to improve not only math achievement, but also reading test scores and non-test outcomes including student attendance and disciplinary incidents. The benefits exist across students from various socioeconomic backgrounds, and they are slightly higher for racial minorities.
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Predicting Math Proficiency Using Grades 1–3 Universal Screeners
Children’s math performance is strongly correlated with later life outcomes, but early gaps in math skills are stubbornly difficult to close. It is therefore important to identify student math needs early. Using Grade 1–3 student records from Kentucky public schools, the study finds that typically recommended cut scores for widely used early grade math screeners severely under-identify student needs in math. Using optimal cut scores estimated by the Classification and Regression Tree (CART) analysis, the likelihood of under identification of at-risk students decreases by an average of 16 percentage points and sensitivity improves by 28 percentage points. These improvements can be achieved without having to collect new data or administer new assessments.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2000483
- PAR ID:
- 10566774
- Publisher / Repository:
- AERA
- Date Published:
- Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
- Mathematics performance, Early elementary grades, Prediction
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Location:
- Philadelphia, PA
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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