The Influence of an Extended School Day on Middle School English Language Arts and Mathematics Achievement in a New Jersey Suburban School District

<p>This study examined the influence of an extended school day, reported in instruction minutes, on academic achievement of general and special education middle school students in one public suburban New Jersey school district using English Language Arts and Mathematics data from the 2014 New Jersey Assessment of Skills and Knowledge (NJ ASK). The sample was selected using Propensity Score Matching, a statistical technique employed to reduce the influence of selection bias. The final sample consisted of 238 students in Grade 6, 238 in Grade 7, and 238 in Grade 8 in the New Jersey suburban, upper middle-income school district during the years 2011-2014. The variables that were included in this study were gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, attendance, enrollment in the extended school day middle school, special education, and past performance as measured by the Grade 5 New Jersey Assessment of Skills and Knowledge. Analyses were conducted using analysis of covariance (ANCOVA), and factorial ANCOVA, analysis of variance (ANOVA), and factorial ANOVA. Results of this study indicated that attending the extended-day school with increased instructional minutes did not have a statistically significant impact on the performance of this sample of middle school students on the English Language Arts and Mathematics sections of the 2014 NJ ASK in nine of ten research questions. The null hypothesis was not supported by the data analysis and was therefore rejected in analysis of the interaction of extended school day and ethnicity on the academic achievement of middle school students in Grades 6-8 on the 2014 New Jersey Assessment of Skills and Knowledge (NJ ASK) in Mathematics. The significant differences on the adjusted marginal mean scores for Mathematics achievement based on ethnicity are important to note and are discussed further in Chapter 5. Further research is needed on extended school day to determine what additional factors may have contributed to these findings.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Executive Ed.D. in Education Leadership Management and Policy

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Education Leadership, Management and Policy

Year dc:date.available

2016

Author dc:creator

• Lindsay-Harewood, Davida

Contributors dc:contributor

• Gerard Babo, Ed.D
• Daniel Gutmore, Ph.D
• Lillie Johnson Edwards, Ph.D

• extended school day
• middle school
• achievement
• Mathematics
• English Language Arts
• propensity score matching
• ethnicity
• gender
• socio-economic status
• special education classification
• Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research

Repository record dc:identifier

https://scholarship.shu.edu/dissertations/2210

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholarship.shu.edu:dissertations-3267