California High School Research Articles

Teaching Even 100 Hours a Week Leaves Children behind

Suppose a teacher in an urban high school wanted to do more than survive. Suppose he wanted to do the job right. Sharpening his pencil and firing up his calculator, Mr. Gleibermann decided to find out just how long that would take. ********** TWO WEEKS after a year of urban high school teaching, I sat down to calculate how many hours a week it would take to leave no child behind. That's no child out of 150, since last year I taught five classes a day, averaging 30 students a class, in a San Francisco public school. I added methodically: teaching five sections of two separate courses every day, tutoring all the students who needed extra help to pass, evaluating papers and projects, and collaborating with other teachers to shape the school's academic program. The total was 140 hours per week. Discovering this mathematical absurdity softened my long-standing despair. Throughout my teaching career, I worked inhuman hours and yet wondered if I was giving enough. Only by putting the raw statistics on paper did I find an antidote to self-blame. I finally discerned that when a great many of my students fall by the academic wayside, the blame belongs not to me, but to a system that would require a teacher to work 140 hours a week to support all his students. How did I arrive at such a frightening figure as 140? The deciding variable is the time required to respond to the academic needs of each individual student. Consider writing as a test case. In a couple of hours I can craft and deliver a focused and engaging writing lesson on thesis design, embedding quotations, or parallel construction and have students edit one another's essays and take notes from a PowerPoint display. But if the goal is to ensure that each of my 150 students can apply the lesson to essay writing and take a step toward passing the writing portion of the state exit exam, no elegant lesson with any group of 30 students will ever succeed. Having high school sophomores learn to write by observing me construct a coherent paragraph on an overhead screen is the instructional equivalent of teaching them to ride a bicycle by showing videotapes. Writing is a complex mental journey. Children need a mentor to navigate the way. If they are going to succeed, I will need to coach many of them individually outside the regular school day. Conscientious teachers who are determined to open academic doorways for all students have been aware for decades that they lack the resources to meet the needs of well over 100 students. But recent state and federal education policy has brought this condition to public awareness. The goal of No Child Left Behind appears admirable: by the year 2014 every child in the nation will test to proficiency in core math and literacy skills. In addition, most states now require seniors to pass an exit exam to receive a diploma. California's high school class of 2006 was the first to fall under this requirement, following a delay four years ago when more than half of the first cohort failed. However, as we investigate what schools need to reach these ambitious goals, we publicly expose a difficult truth that teachers have long experienced one arduous day at a time. Our school system is based on a 19th-century factory model that cycles 150 students a day through a teacher's classroom, a process that was never intended to ensure that all students achieve high-level skills. But we have yet to promote alternative models that might point us toward universal success or to provide resources for public education that would appreciably reduce teacher workload. The current testing regimen and stricter teacher credentialing requirements of recent education policy do not even touch the deeper structural problem. Until we begin to provide resources that, at a minimum, allow teachers to work with far fewer students, any teacher who aims for universal success prescribes for himself eventual mental exhaustion. …

The Stanford Medical Youth Science Program: 18 Years of a Biomedical Program for Low-Income High School Students

The Stanford Medical Youth Science Program (SMYSP) is a biomedical pipeline program that seeks to diversify the health professions by providing academic enrichment in the medical sciences and college admissions support to very low-income high school students. Each summer 24 students are recruited from over 250 California high schools for the five-week residential program, led by 10 undergraduate students. Participants divide their time between classroom instruction, anatomy practicums, hospital field placements, research projects, and college admissions advising. Since its inception in 1988, 405 students have completed SMYSP and 96% have been observed for up to 18 years. The majority are from underrepresented minority groups (33.3% Latino, 21.7% African American, 4.0% Native American), many with poor academic preparation. One hundred percent of age-eligible participants have graduated from high school, and 99% have been admitted to college. Of those admitted to college (and not currently college students), 81% have earned a four-year college degree, the majority majoring in biological and physical sciences (57.1%). Among four-year college graduates, 52% are attending or have graduated from medical or graduate school. Many of the four-year college graduates (44.4%) are becoming or have become health professionals. This program, distinguished by direct participation in the sciences, strong mentoring, college admissions preparation, and long-term career guidance, has been highly successful in reaching low-income students and preparing them for medical and other careers. Results highlight the need to track students for as long as 10 to 15 years to accurately assess college graduation rates and acceptance to medical and graduate school.

Direct and Indirect Pathways between Parental Constructive Behavior and Adolescent Affiliation with Achievement-Oriented Peers

We investigated the direct and indirect pathways through which parental constructive behavior may influence the adolescent’s affiliation with achievement-oriented peers. Using a longitudinal survey data set from nine California and Wisconsin high schools (from 9th through 12th grades, with an approximate age range from 14 through 18) structural equation models were estimated. Our longitudinal analyses confirmed an indirect effect from Time 1 parental constructive behavior and a direct effect from Time 2 parental constructive behavior on an increase in the perceived achievement orientation of friends at Time 2, net of the stability effect from the prior values of the perceived achievement orientation of friends at Time 1. A point to be emphasized is that parental influence on peer affiliation in late adolescence remains significant even as parental involvement in adolescents’ lives diminishes. In addition, the direct effect from Time 2 parental constructive behavior on the perceived achievement-orientation of friends appears stronger for boys than for girls.

Engendering Participation, Deliberating Dependence: Inner-City Adolescents’ Perceptions of Classroom Practice

This ethnographic study of high school students’ classroom practices and perceptions about participation reveals the extent to which students’ perceptions determine their understandings of practice, even when these understandings conflict with researcher observations and the bulk of the literature on gender and participation. This study shows, moreover, that although there were gender-stratified patterns of participation in the classroom between girls and boys, the underlying conceptualizations about what constituted a supportive environment for participation differed little between genders: Both girls and boys revealed themselves as dependent upon teachers, peers, and “knowing.” What did differ were the ways in which girls and boys described this dependence and the ways in which they understood what occurred in classrooms. Conducted at a large inner-city high school in California populated primarily by low-income, first-generation Latina/Latino students, classroom research took place over a period of 2 years in a series of Life Skills for the 21st Century classes. Dependent primarily upon formal interviews and participant observations, this research focus was on how particular participation strategies were understood and made manifest in the classroom. Beyond the contributions of new information on the importance of the relationship of perception to practice, this research shows that we need to be cautious when we think about gender issues, and how students, particularly ethnic minorities, understand the classroom dynamic.

Engendering Participation, Deliberating Dependence: Inner-City Adolescents’ Perceptions of Classroom Practice

This ethnographic study of high school students’ classroom practices and perceptions about participation reveals the extent to which students’ perceptions determine their understandings of practice, even when these understandings conflict with researcher observations and the bulk of the literature on gender and participation. This study shows, moreover, that although there were gender-stratified patterns of participation in the classroom between girls and boys, the underlying conceptualizations about what constituted a supportive environment for participation differed little between genders: Both girls and boys revealed themselves as dependent upon teachers, peers, and “knowing.” What did differ were the ways in which girls and boys described this dependence and the ways in which they understood what occurred in classrooms. Conducted at a large inner-city high school in California populated primarily by low-income, first-generation Latina/Latino students, classroom research took place over a period of 2 years in a series of Life Skills for the 21st Century classes. Dependent primarily upon formal interviews and participant observations, this research focus was on how particular participation strategies were understood and made manifest in the classroom. Beyond the contributions of new information on the importance of the relationship of perception to practice, this research shows that we need to be cautious when we think about gender issues, and how students, particularly ethnic minorities, understand the classroom dynamic.

Injuries to High School Football Athletes in California

Background Among all high school sports, football has the highest rate of injury. Prior research has been limited primarily because of challenges in surveillance, defining injuries, and measuring exposures. Hypothesis Football injury patterns differ across player and session characteristics. Study Design Descriptive epidemiology study. Methods More than 5000 football players from 87 high schools in California were observed for 2 seasons (2001 and 2002). School representatives were trained to collect data on injuries, player characteristics, and daily exposures. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and clustered Poisson regression. Results Players sustained 25.5 injuries per 100 players, 9.3 injuries per 10 000 player-hours, and 8.4 injuries per 100 session-hours. Session rates were highest during games, on artificial turf (13.8 of 100), during foggy weather (25.1 of 100), and on clear evenings (21 of 100). Offensive and defensive backfielders had about a 20% increased rate of injury compared with linemen. The adjusted injury rate for starters was 60% higher than the rate for nonstarters (relative rate, 1.6; 95% confidence interval, 1.4-1.9). Conclusion Risk profiles differed by experience, playing position, and surface types. We recommend future sports injury research that measures time-dependent exposures at the individual level and for various types of environmental playing conditions.

Physical Activity Influences Body Composition, Inflammatory Mediators, Growth Factors and Bone Development in BMI-Matched Female Adolescents

Despite widespread evidence that physical activity improves a variety of lifelong health outcomes, it has been difficult to distinguish the effect of physical activity from that of body composition on circulating inflammatory mediators and anatomical features such as bone mineral density (BMD) in healthy growing adolescents. We matched adolescent girls by age, maturity and BMI to explore inflammatory mediators and BMD differences associated with participation in high school sport. PURPOSE: To determine if participation in high school sports programs influence pro/anti-inflammatory markers, body composition, bone density and growth mediators in adolescent females. METHODS: Non-obese sedentary (n=39) and physic ally-active (i.e. sport participants, n=39) adolescent females were matched for age (mean=15.5 yrs), maturity (Tanner=4-5) and BMI (mean=21.75). Comparisons were made between fitness level, body composition, bone mineralization and circulating levels of inflammatory cytokines, growth mediators, and bone turnover markers. Participants were healthy adolescent girls recruited from 2 Southern California high schools. Activity and fitness level were assessed using a 3-day Physical Activity Recall, DEXA and ramp-type progressive exercise test on cycle ergometer. Blood samples were obtained following overnight fast using standard phlebotomy. Comparisons were made using unpaired t-tests on variables of interest (significance set at p <0.05) reported as mean ±SEM. RESULTS: Compared to sedentary adolescent females, the active girls had significantly higher fitness levels (VO2max ml/min/kg) 36 ±1 vs 23 ±1; lean body mass (kg)43.4±0.7vs 39.2 ± 0.7; and whole body bone mineral density (g/cm2) 0.99 ± 0.02 vs 0.95 ±0.01(active vs sedentary p <0.05). Additionally, physically active girls had favorable levels of growth and bone development markers Osteocalcin (ng/ml) 12.54±1.2vs7.68±0.5;BSAP(U/L)59.5±2.7vs41.6±2.7;Adiponectin(ng/ml) 12,154 ± 600 vs 9,081 ± 470; and Leptin (ng/ml) 17.7 ± 1.8 vs 26.29 ± 2.6; as well as pro and anti-inflammatory balance IL6 (pg/ml) 1.21 ± 0.2 vs 1.91 ± 0.3; IL1ra (pg/ml) 341.7 ± 19.4 vs 467.7 ± 53.9; and TNFα (pg/ml) 1.65 ± 0.2 vs 2.51 ± 0.3. CONCLUSION: Despite matching adolescent girls for BMI and age, physical activity was associated with favorable physiological measures of body composition, bone density and circulating inflammatory markers. BMI alone does not appear to be an adequate measure of inflammatory status of physically active and inactive adolescent girls.

The Intersection of Accountability and Language: Can Reading Intervention Replace English Language Development?

The language in recent education policy equates academic achievement with reading proficiency for English language learners (ELLs). In response to federal and state accountability efforts focused on reading, California high schools began to substitute reading intervention programs for English language development (ELD) curricula and instruction. This study compared the effect of a reading intervention program to that of a comprehensive ELD program on ELLs' achievement at one California high school. Ultimately, the comparison cohort earned higher achievement test scores than the reading intervention program cohort. Perhaps most striking, however, was the sheer proportion of ELLs excluded from services due to reading levels beyond the program exit level. As educators work to improve ELL achievement, the importance of curricula that meet students at their linguistic and academic level cannot be understated.

Foreign Language Education, Academic Performance, and Socioeconomic Status: A Study of California Schools

This study examines various features oj foreign language program offerings at 220 public high schools in California. Foreign language program features were examined in relation to the school's Academic Performance Index (API), the school's socioeconomic status (percentage of students eligible for free or reduced‐price lunch), and percentage of English language learners (ELLs). High API ranking high schools reported a larger percentage of students enrolled in foreign language classes, more foreign language teachers, fewer emergency‐credentialed teachers, more feeder middle school foreign language programs, more study abroad and foreign exchange programs, and more technology use in foreign language teaching. However, these relationships were not found in low socioeconomic schools and schools with larger numbers of ELLs. Foreign language educators can use the findings to offer recommendations to school administrators, policymakers, and professional organizations about ways to improve the teaching oj foreign languages in secondary schools regardless of students' socioeconomic status or the growing population oj ELLs.

Understanding the Role of Parents and Siblings as Information Sources in the College Choice Process of Chicana Students

Guided by a social capital framework, this qualitative study examined the role of protective agents, namely parents and siblings, during the college choice process of 20 Chicana seniors attending a large urban high school in California. Despite previous research showing that Mexican parents hold a high value toward the importance of an education, this study shows that the role that parents were able to fulfill during the college choice process was greatly limited. The findings of this study also suggest that in many cases, siblings replaced parents as information sources when parents were not able to assist Chicanas with the college application process. These findings raise questions about the college information sources available to Chicanas outside the home, such as schools or community agencies.

Participation in Extracurricular Activities and Adolescent Adjustment: Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Findings

This study extends previous understanding of the association between adolescent extracurricular activity participation and adjustment by asking whether participation in school-based extracurricular activities is associated with lower substance use and depression, higher grades and academic aspirations, and more positive attitude toward school. In addition, it examines the role of life events stress and time spent in activities as potential moderators of the association. Data come from an ethnically diverse sample of adolescents from 6 California highschools (N = 3,761). Cross-sectional results suggest participation is associated with more positive adolescent outcomes for all variables except alcohol use and depression, controlling for gender, ethnicity, and grade. Longitudinal analyses are consistent with these findings. Cumulative participation over a 3-year period predicts adolescent outcomes controlling for both Time 1 outcomes and demographic characteristics. In addition, within-person analyses reveal year-to-year covariation of participation and positive outcomes.

TEST REVIEW: High-Stakes Testing: Does the California High School Exit Exam Measure Up?

In 2002, President George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act. In addition to providing additional funding for schools and encouraging local autonomy, the new law focuses on accountability in an attempt to close the achievement gap for all students, leaving no child behind. Perhaps the most striking manifestation of Bush's new law is the amplified attention on high-stakes testing as a means to demonstrate accountability. The California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE) is California's effort to ensure accountability by proving that students are proficient in English language arts and mathematics on graduation. Hailed as near flawless by an independent evaluating agency, the test is nonetheless the subject of much debate. Because testing as a means of demonstrating accountability is surely becoming a reality, the CAHSEE must be examined to ensure its fairness. Kunnan's (2004) test fairness framework makes it possible to examine the test within the context of fairness using 5 main qualities: validity, absence of bias, access, administration, and social consequences. The framework is particularly relevant to the CAHSEE because the test's potential for impact is so great. In the end, some questions regarding the test's fairness remain. Although full implementation of the test as a requirement for high school graduation is scheduled for the class of 2006, it is not yet certain whether next year's graduates will have to pass the CAHSEE.

“No Show” Study: College Destinations of University of California Applicants and Admits Who Did Not Enroll, 1997-2002

This study examines trends in University of California (UC) “no shows”—students who applied and were admitted to UC but enrolled elsewhere—before and after the elimination of affirmative action at UC in 1998. Two main findings emerge from the data. Overall, UC continues to be successful in attracting and enrolling a majority of high-achieving students from California high schools. However, overall enrollment patterns mask substantial variations across different racial and ethnic groups. Top underrepresented minority applicants enroll at UC at considerably lower rates than other students, and the gap has widened noticeably in the 5 years since the elimination of affirmative action in UC admissions, as many of these students are now choosing to attend selective private colleges and universities. The policy implications of these trends are considered.

High School Segregation and Access to the University of California

Using institutional data on fall 1999 freshman admissions, we document the existence and magnitude of inequalities among California high schools in the access they provide to the University of California (UC). Because high schools are segregated by socioeconomic status and race, we examine how schools that differ on these dimensions also differ in their rates of admission to UC. We find that UC admission rates are grossly unequal between the public and private sectors and within each sector. Different groups, however, face different barriers. Schools where the student body is heavily Latino tend to have low per capita admissions because fewer students apply; schools where the student body is heavily African American tend to have low per capita admissions because fewer applicants are admitted. Our research suggests the need for both high school outreach to increase applications and contextual review of applications to reduce inequalities in the admission of applicants.

Search for correlated high energy cosmic ray events with CHICOS

We present the results of a search for time correlations in high energy cosmic ray data (primary E > 1014 eV) collected by the California HIgh school Cosmic ray ObServatory (CHICOS) array. Data from 60 detector sites spread over an area of 400 km2 were studied for evidence of isolated events separated by more than 1 km with coincidence times ranging from 1 µs up to 1 s. The results are consistent with the absence of excess coincidences except for a 2.9σ excess observed for coincidence times less than 10 µs. We report upper limits for the coincidence probability as a function of coincidence time.

Pregnant Adolescent Reflectionsof Parental Communication

The purpose of this study is to describe reflections of parental communication from the perspective of pregnant adolescents prior to pregnancy and during pregnancy. This qualitative design, using grounded theory methodology and semistructured interviews collected data from a convenience sample of predominantly Hispanic adolescent women (n = 30) in 4 settings. Participants were recruited from 3 area clinics and a transitional high school in California. The findings identified 7 themes from the interview data to support the adolescent perceptions of poor communication and unstable relationships with parents prior to the pregnancy and difficulty in communicating about the pregnancy to parents. Most participants identified a significant improvement in relationships and communication when pregnancy occurred. It is important for nurses to incorporate family communication strategies in their adolescent health interventions to help decrease the adolescent pregnancy rate.

Appropriating Policy: Constructing Positions for English Language Learners

In this ethnographic study, I investigate the ways in which students of Mexican descent who are designated as limited English proficient are “acquired” by particular social positions in a northern California high school. Focusing on two interrelated and reflexive phenomena in the high school—standardized testing for assessing English proficiency and instruction in English Language Development classes—I demonstrate how, through these institutional rituals and their associated discourses, positions for English language learners are constructed, maintained, and challenged. I examine the interactions of the teachers, staff, administrators, and students across various school settings to illuminate the practical implications of, for instance, being designated limited or fluently proficient in English. I suggest that second-language acquisition policy is appropriated with great variability across federal, state, district, and school levels, and I argue that through these courses of action, particular social fields and the positions for English language learners are defined locally as ones of “success” and more often “failure.”

Technology and Equity in Schooling: Deconstructing the Digital Divide

This qualitative study compared the availability of, access to, and use of new technologies in a group of low– and high–socioeconomic status (SES) California high schools. Although student-computer ratios in the schools were similar, the social contexts of computer use differed, with low-SES schools affected by uneven human support networks, irregular home access to computers by students, and pressure to raise school test scores while addressing the needs of large numbers of English learners. These differences were expressed within three main patterns of technology access and use, labeled performativity, workability, and complexity, each of which shaped schools’ efforts to deploy new technologies for academic preparation.

Styles and stereotypes

The article examines how two Laotian American teenage girls in a multiracial California high school take divergent pathways through two contrasting stereotypes of Southeast Asian Americans: The model–minority nerd and the dangerous gangster. The two girls, both first-generation immigrants, each draw on contrasting linguistic and youth-cultural practices to align themselves to some degree with one of these stereotypes while distancing themselves from the other. The absence of an ethnically marked variety of Asian American English does not prevent the construction of Asian American identities; instead, speakers make use of locally available linguistic resources in their everyday speech practices, including African American Vernacular English and youth slang, to produce linguistic and cultural styles that position them partly inside and partly outside of the school’s binary black/white racial ideology. The article argues that linguistic resources need not be distinctive either between or within ethnic groups in order to produce social identities.

Whiteness as Giftedness: Racial Formation at an Urban High School

By examining a gifted magnet of an urban California high school as a racial project, this study contributes to our understanding of racial formation. The study analyzes the organizational and representational practices of this voluntary desegregation tool—a partial-site magnet program for “gifted” students—and its impact on students inside and outside the program. In doing so, the study reveals how, in contrast to its stated mission, this form of voluntary desegregation actually constitutes a form of resegregation. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, this research reveals a series of practices that have produced exclusionary access to the gifted program, limited the interaction between magnet and non-magnet students, and instituted an apparently color-blind discourse of the gifted as in need of protection, all contributing to a widespread though complex and contradictory notion of whiteness as giftedness. Such notions run counter to the original intent of the desegregation ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. Revealing the processes by which a desegregation instrument facilitates such contradictory outcomes provides critical insights into the dynamic nature of racial formation.