CRITICAL ISSUES IN SPECIAL EDUCATION AND GENERAL EDUCATION: IMPROVING OUTCOMES FOR STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES AND ADDRESSING ABSENTEEISM

This dissertation comprises three studies that delve into critical areas of inquiry in both special education and general education. Study 1 uses a nationally representative dataset and presents a thorough descriptive analysis of the characteristics of students with disabilities (SWDs) who attended pre-K in school-based and center-based settings, as well as those who did not attend pre-K. I also look at associations between attending school-based pre-K (SBPK) and disability status from kindergarten to 5th grade. Results demonstrate that attending SBPK was more predictive of having a disability throughout elementary school, when compared to both center-based pre-K (CBPK) and no pre-K, though the strength of the association decreased over time. Additional analyses did not reveal a relationship between disability status and whether the child stayed in the same school building for pre-K and kindergarten.Study 2 expands upon the foundation of the first study by focusing on SWDs and looking at associations between attending SBPK and elementary school outcomes. I find that SBPK attenders initially appeared to have worse outcomes than CBPK attenders and better outcomes than pre-K non-attenders in certain areas, but after employing propensity score matching, these differences disappeared. Thus, attending SBPK appeared to have neither a positive nor negative impact on elementary school outcomes. However, sensitivity analyses on students without disabilities provide suggestive evidence that SBPK attendance was associated with better socio-emotional skills in kindergarten than CBPK attendance. Finally, Study 3 focuses on absenteeism, a significant problem that reaches all students across all grade levels. I use qualitative comparative analysis to synthesize results across numerous studies of absenteeism interventions in order to understand what aspects of interventions are associated with improved attendance. Results demonstrate that across all schooling levels, nudge interventions were the dominant path to improving attendance. Family engagement represented a smaller but still sufficient route to increased attendance in pre-K and elementary school, while interventions built solely upon instruction were secondary pathways in middle school and high school. A consistent pattern across schooling levels indicated that most of the sufficient conditions occurred in the absence of whole-school interventions and policies.

Author dc:creator

• Kim, Philip

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Gottfried, Michael, A.

• Education

Language dc:language.iso

en

Repository record dc:identifier.uri

https://repository.upenn.edu/handle/20.500.14332/62798

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:repository.upenn.edu:20.500.14332/62798