A Systematic Test of the Effective Schools Model

Abstract

This article presents cross-sectional data on the relation between school achievement and measures of school environment, particularly “effective schools” characteristics. The data are for 38 high schools, 32 middle schools, and 134 elementary schools, across 22 districts in the Milwaukee metropolitan area. The achievement measures include standardized test data in math and reading, as well as dropout rates. In addition to a wide range of school characteristics, key measures of school environment were collected through lengthy mailed surveys of 5,500 teachers in the districts. In addition to an effective schools index, we analyze the effects of parental involvement and variation in teacher control of key decisions in schools. The findings offer support for the notion that school environment has an effect on achievement. They also show that the complex of environmental variables that are significantly related to achievement are themselves highly intercorrelated and very much affected by the location of the school (city or suburbs) and the student population in the schools. These results lead us to question the direction of causality and thus the certainty of success of intervention programs along current effective schools lines.