Composition Of Student Body Research Articles

In/visible hurdles: US collegiate esports participants’ perceived barriers to play and involvement

Gaming and esports communities possess cultural barriers that exclude potential participants, limiting their access to social, cultural, and economic opportunities. In the United States, for instance, varsity esports players are increasingly supported by scholarships and tournament prizes, but persistent challenges make these benefits accessible to only a limited portion of the student body. Using a grounded theory analysis of 31 in-depth interviews with collegiate esports players, administrators, and student workers, this study examines perceived barriers and their (in)visibility to different participants. We find that gender and race are readily acknowledged, while other identities (age, physical ability, etc.) are overlooked. Moreover, visibility did not necessarily correlate with meaningful strategies for inclusion. While collegiate esports could be a welcoming and equitable environment, these findings suggest it will not be so until all hurdles are (1) made visible and (2) addressed relative to a university’s own student body composition.

When Sarah Meets Lawrence: The Effects of Coeducation on Women's College Major Choices.

We leverage variation in the adoption of coeducation by U.S. women's colleges to study how exposure to a mixed-gender collegiate environment affects women's human capital investments. Our event-study analyses of newly collected historical data find a 3.0-3.5 percentage-point (30-33%) decline in the share of women majoring in STEM. While coeducation caused a large influx of male peers and modest increase in male faculty, we find no evidence that it altered the composition of the female student body or other gender-neutral inputs. Extrapolation of our main estimate suggests that coeducational environments explain 36% of the current gender gap in STEM.

Increasing Latinx representation in the US medical schools: A top-ranked medical school's experience.

Despite the increasing racial and ethnic diversity of the general US population, many, if not most, medical schools fall short of matriculating students reflective of this change in diversity. The Latinx community constitutes nearly 20% of the US population and is expected to rise substantially in the coming decades. Over the past 20 years, the number of Latinx students applying to and being admitted to medical school has grown but remains below 4% of the total medical student body composition. Several factors contribute to the under-representation of Latinx students in medical schools that include access to secondary education, finances, lack of mentorship or advice, and a multitude of other structural inequities and system-level biases. Diversity, equity, and inclusion are often named as key pillars of workforce development across the US medical schools and academic institutions. Despite significant efforts, medical schools continue to have low Latinx representation within their student body, and recruitment efforts often lack sustainability. In this manuscript, we share our experience of increasing Latinx student representation within a top-ranked medical school in the US southeast region. We have discussed the barriers we faced in enrolling and attracting Latinx students' amidst similar under-representation of Latinx faculty, staff, and leadership and the challenges of financial support for applicants and financial aid packages for admitted students. The strategies we implemented to achieve an increased representation of Latinx students in the School of Medicine (SOM) included revitalizing the Latino Medical Student Association (LMSA), ensuring Latinx student representation within the SOM admission committee that included Latinx faculty as active participants in recruitment and retention efforts, redesigning the medical Spanish course, and creating dedicated outreach plans during second look weekend for interested Latinx students and active outreach to applicants and accepted students by current students. In combination, these efforts led to a significant increase in Latinx representation in the SOM student body from 2.6% in 2009 to 12.2% in 2021. We will conclude by discussing our ongoing challenges and our approach to sustain and improve Latinx representation in our medical school.

Student vulnerabilities and confidence in learning in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic

ABSTRACT How did the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic impact student learning in higher education? Everywhere, Sars-CoV-2 struck hardest in the most disadvantaged communities. This paper asks whether the virus's disproportionate effect on more vulnerable groups is replicated among college and university students. Data come from approximately 3800 students studying at nine higher education institutions located in six different countries around the globe. Conventional imagery of the ‘Ivory Tower’ treats colleges and universities as cloistered academic spaces beyond the ‘real world.’ Such imagery suggests that the patterns of COVID-19 inequity seen in the general population might not hold within higher education. However, the composition of the post-secondary student body has become more diverse and more representative. This could mean that patterns of inequity from the general population might hold, although perhaps at muted strength, among college and university students. We investigate the higher education context, asking how the characteristics of students, such as their gender or family background, their digital access, and their living arrangements during the COVID-19 pandemic, impacted their self-reported ability to learn. The paper finds that students in more difficult situations – no study space, too much noise, and poorer health – reported greater disruption to their learning than did their peers who experienced fewer challenging living arrangements. Vulnerability, as measured by students in traditionally marginalized positions, had smaller impacts on student's confidence in learning.

High Prevalence of Both Previous Infection with SARS-CoV-2 and Persistent Symptoms.

Universities are unique settings with large populations, congregate housing, and frequent attendance of events in large groups. However, the current prevalence of previous COVID-19 infection in university students, including symptomatic and asymptomatic disease, is unknown. Our goal therefore was to determine the prevalence of previous infection, risk factors for infection, and the prevalence of persistent symptoms following infection among university students. This was a cross-sectional study set in a large public university between January 22 and March 22, 2021. We surveyed students about demographics, risk factors, and symptoms, and simultaneously tested their saliva for IgA antibodies to SARS-CoV-2. To estimate the prevalence of previous infection we adjusted our intentional sample of a diverse student population for year in school and age to resemble the composition of the entire student body and adjusted for the imperfect sensitivity and specificity of the antibody test. Univariate and multiple regression analysis was used to identify independent risk factors for infection, and the proportion of students with persistent symptoms following acute infection was determined. A total of 488 students completed the survey, 432 had a valid antibody result, and 428 had both. The estimated prevalence of previous infection for 432 participants with valid antibody results was 41%. Of 145 students in our sample with a positive antibody test, 41.4% denied having a previous positive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test for SARS-CoV-2 and presumably had an asymptomatic infection; in our adjusted analysis we estimate that approximately 2-thirds of students had asymptomatic infections. Independent risk factors for infection included male sex, having a roommate with a known symptomatic infection, and having two or fewer roommates. More frequent attendance of parties and bars was a univariate risk factor, but not in the multiple regression analysis. Of 122 students reporting a previous symptomatic infection, 14 (11.4%) reported persistent symptoms consistent with postacute COVID-19 a median of 132 days later. Previous COVID-19 infection, both symptomatic and asymptomatic, was common at a large university. Measures that could prevent resurgence of the infection when students return to campus include mandatory vaccination policies, mass surveillance testing, and testing of sewage for antigen to SARS-CoV-2.

Assessment of Top-Down Design of Tsunami Evacuation Strategies Based on Drill and Modelled Data

Tsunami evacuation drills are helpful tools aimed at reinforcing procedures and practices to reduce disaster risk, especially for vulnerable populations like school-age children. While the predictive value of evacuation drill data has been pointed out, challenges exist in enhancing the scientific examination of this information, with the final aim of improving proactive preparedness and scenario-based evacuation strategies. We address this gap by delivering a mixed-method approach that combines ground-collected data and tsunami and evacuation computer-based modelling, using as a case study the evacuation drill performance of four K-12 schools in the cities of Valparaíso and Viña del Mar, Chile. Our main objective was to critically assess the efficacy of the drill-based evacuation procedures of the schools by comparing them in the light of a likely worst-case tsunami scenario (based on historical data from the 1730 event) in these areas. Our findings show that, although a large number of evacuees from the schools could rapidly achieve evacuation to safe locations, complete evacuation (that is, 100% of evacuees reaching the shelter) is only achievable if the Evacuation Onset Times (i.e. the time, relative to the earthquake, of the first evacuee departing from the school) are shorter than demanding threshold values (between 4 and 14 min), as the result of the tsunami’s short arrival time and rapid inland penetration. Hence, we suggest complementing existing national-level protocols with a more detailed, case-by-case management approach, comprising a more precise tsunami inundation modelling and a focus on the characteristics of each of the schools (relative to the student body composition such as age and others, the staff, and the geomorphological conditions of its location). Moreover, we suggest that tsunami evacuation drills in Chile pose significant research opportunities yet to be fully grasped.

And Now for Some Good News: Trends in Student Retention at Community Colleges, 2004-2017.

Community colleges have been under pressure for years to improve retention rates. Considering well-publicized reductions in state funding during and after the Great Recession, progress in this area is unexpected. And yet this is precisely what we find. Using the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), we find an average increase in retention of nearly 5 percentage points, or 9 percent, across the sector from 2004 to 2017. Over 70% of institutions posted retention gains, and average improvement occurred yearly over the period excepting a reversal at the height of the Great Recession. Gains were smaller on average at schools with higher tuition and that serve more disadvantaged populations, and larger at institutions with lower student-faculty ratios and higher per-student instructional spending. Fixed-effects regression and Oaxaca decomposition analyses demonstrate that these gains were not caused by observable changes in student body composition or in institutional characteristics such as increased per-student instructional spending.

Firm in the Faith: How Religiously Affiliated Institutions Stay True to their Religious Moorings

During a period when secularization poses many challenges to religiously affiliated colleges and universities, several key factors have been identified that can support these institutions in effectively meeting those challenges. This article identifies four of the principal drivers of secularization and how they have manifested themselves over the course of the 20th century. Those drivers are changes in the composition of university leadership, faculty, and student body; a push to comply with the accepted standards for academic excellence and the secularization of knowledge; a desire to be more like mainstream colleges and universities; and the need to accommodate growing religious pluralism in society. The article also identifies important actions that can support religiously affiliated postsecondary institutions in staying connected to their founding religious traditions. These factors include a clearly articulated vision for the institution that is based in the religious tradition, university leadership that is supportive of maintaining the connection between institution and religious tradition, and a strong campus culture based in the values of the religious tradition. The article then uses the experiences of Brigham Young University as an example of how these factors work together to counter secularization. The leadership decisions and actions taken by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Brigham Young University President Howard S. McDonald (1945–1949) are offered as a case study that may provide insights to other institutions at a time when trends in the United States continue to shift toward secularization.

Understanding Disproportionate Suspension Practices for Black Students in Elementary, Middle, and High Schools

There are racial and ethnic disparities in use of out-of-school suspensions within the United States. The present study assessed for the presence of disproportionate suspension by race, special education status, and receipt of free or reduced cost meals using two separate metrics (risk ratios and raw differential representation); evaluated separate models of disproportionate suspension for students identified as Black, White, and Hispanic; and examined potential curvilinear associations between the proportion of the racial/ethnic group within the school population and disproportionate suspension. Aggregate data from elementary (n = 27), middle (n = 9), and high (n = 4) U.S. schools with over 105,000 students were included. Results indicated disproportionate suspension was present for Black-identified students, students in special education, and those with socioeconomic difficulties. Metrics of risk ratios and raw differential representation demonstrated somewhat different patterns in disproportionate suspension. We observed a significant curvilinear effect of the proportion of the school body identified as Black versus White on suspension practices. Students identified as White in schools with a larger White student body were more protected from suspension whereas students identified as Black were overrepresented among those suspended regardless of the student body composition. Findings suggest Black-identified students experience differential treatment in school settings and future tested models are encouraged to include more specific teacher and school administrator factors. IMPACT STATEMENT Theory suggests the proportion of the student body identified as Black or White may differentially influence suspension practices for Black and White students. The current study demonstrated support for this theory, with protective effects against suspension for White students in a predominantly White student body. Conversely, Black students were suspended more as the student body became more proportionally Black.

Disparity in child welfare referrals from public schools: An example of Simpson’s Paradox?

BackgroundBlack children continue to be found in child welfare outcome measures at rates nearly double those of White children in the United States. Researchers have turned from bias theory to risk theory, arguing that disparity disappears when considering only the subgroup of children in poverty. In this study, we consider whether this phenomenon is an example of Simpson’s Paradox, where aggregate findings are confounded by a third factor. ParticipantsWe created a dataset by matching child welfare data to schools in a metropolitan California county. MethodsWe consider measures of poverty and racial-ethnic student composition as possible confounders, utilizing compositional data analysis for the latter. Traditional linear and ridge regression models were used to calculate the unadjusted and adjusted effects of each independent variable. ResultsWe find only partial evidence of Simpson’s Paradox, in that Black to White disparity only disappears in the highest quartile of poverty. Holding poverty constant, only increasing student population non-White composition was significantly associated with reducing Black to White disparity ratios. ConclusionIn a small, exploratory study, we find that while poverty may serve as an equalizer, diversity racial/ethnic student body composition may serve as a neutralizer. We find that underlying causes of disparity are complex and caution against endorsement of single theories to explain the disproportionate representation of Black children in child welfare. We find utility in analyzing child welfare data with concepts and techniques common in other disciplines and highlight several weaknesses of current child welfare informatics which impact both program evaluation and research.

Understanding Classroom Bullying Climates: the Role of Student Body Composition, Relationships, and Teaching Quality

Scores of intervention programs these days apply instructional and, sometimes, systemic strategies to reduce bullying in schools. However, meta-analyses show that, on average, such programs decrease bullying and victimization only by around 20%, and often show no or negative effects in middle and high schools. Due to these sobering results, we propose the idea that bullying prevention for adolescents needs to focus more strongly on systemically informed relationship-building efforts. Building on past research, this study focuses on several aspects of relationships and classroom climate which are significant predictors of bullying behaviors: SES, ethnicity, and teaching quality. We propose the hypothesis that the link between classroom-level bullying and three classroom-level factors—students’ SES background, students’ ethnicity, and teaching quality—is mediated by the quality of student-teacher and student-student relationships (STR and SSR). The study uses multilevel structural regression modeling (M-SRM) to analyze a large and ethnically diverse American survey dataset (N = 146,044 students). Results confirm the hypothesis, showing that the relationships between SES and bullying, and between ethnicity and bullying, are entirely mediated by the quality of STR and SSR; the link between SES and bullying is even over-explained by the two relationship factors. Furthermore, the quality of STR is a positive predictor of medium strength (standardized coefficient = 0.45) of the quality of SSR. The findings suggest that schools with high levels of bullying behavior among students need to (re-)focus teacher professional development on relationship-building skills as well as instructional and a range of systemically informed improvement efforts.

Austrian Intelligence Reform: do intelligence and security studies have a future in Austria?

ABSTRACTThis essay examines the Austrian experience with intelligence, security and terrorism studies. After a brief discussion of the state of intelligence and security studies in Austria, the authors provide a comparison to Singapore, a nation with similar geopolitical issues as well as a different and, arguably, more developed and comprehensive academic program to confront and deal effectively with security challenges. The article concludes with four critical suggestions for the establishment of a ‘Central European’ Intelligence and Security Studies program in Austria. The authors recommend combining academics and practitioners on program faculties, emphases on domestic, regional and extra-regional factors in both program contents and the composition of student bodies, an interdisciplinary approach to the critical role of ideologies, and the development of specific expertise in order to understand and confront regional threats.

More Than a Sorting Machine: Ethnic Boundary Making in a Stratified School System

This article examines the structural conditions that shape ethnic boundary making in the school setting. While previous work has focused on the ethnic composition of student bodies, this study places schools in their institutional and local contexts. The authors argue that the formation of identities and networks varies across local areas depending on the extent of ethnic stratification across schools. Empirically, the authors turn to the case of Germany, where the role of schools as producers of categorical inequalities is particularly obvious. The analysis links large-scale survey data on adolescents’ identification and networks with administrative geocoded information on local stratification across secondary schools. The authors find that minority students in schools with identical ethnic compositions show different inclinations to identify as a majority group member and to form friendships with majority peers, depending on the local extent of ethnic stratification across schools. To place these findin...

Left Behind: District Secession and the Re-segregation of American Schools

ABSTRACT Sixty-five years after the Brown v. Board decision, American schools are re-segregated and re-segregating. The mechanisms of this re-segregation are legal action, voluntary moves towards unitary status, unintended consequences of integration-oriented strategies, and an increasing trend towards the fracturing, or splintering of school districts. Both economic and political theory would indicate that splintering districts would work to pull racial and economic advantage out of the remaining district and into their own. To test this theory, we created a dataset that captures the fiscal and demographic status of U.S. school districts between 2000 and 2014 and analyzed the effect of district separation on the remaining districts in terms of student body composition, overall integration and local, state, and federal resources. Our findings indicate that separating districts are less diverse than the districts left behind. We further find that separating districts gain resources from local revenue and that remaining districts gain federal revenue in insufficient amounts to account for the loss of local funds. We find that these relative disadvantages for left behind districts and relative advantages for seceding districts persist when compared to the general population of school districts.

The effects of physical education on student fitness, achievement, and behavior

Despite the mounting evidence that physical education (PE) has health and education benefits for elementary-aged children, much less is known on the effectiveness of such programs for older children. To study the effects of PE on adolescents, we analyze the impact of Texas Fitness Now (TFN), a four-year $37 million grant program that mandated daily PE for middle-school students in low-income schools. Using a regression discontinuity approach to exploit the cutoff in school eligibility, we find that daily PE mandates do not lead to overall improvements in student fitness, including cardiovascular endurance, strength, and flexibility. Although we show that the program was ineffective at changing average student body composition, estimates indicate a reduction in the proportion of obese students. Using individual-level school records data, we find that PE does not lead to positive spillover effects in the classroom, including improvements in standardized test scores, or increases in attendance for 6th, 7th and 8th graders. Instead, we provide some evidence to suggest that PE reduces attendance rates and increases disciplinary incidents for middle-school students.

Exploring academic teasing: predictors and outcomes of teasing for making mistakes in classrooms

ABSTRACT People in ideal learning environments recognize the value of making mistakes and welcome them. However, the reality in many classrooms is that students are ridiculed by their peers for making mistakes. This paper explores academic teasing in schools, i.e. making fun of others for making mistakes. Using Tripod student survey data from spring 2017, this paper demonstrates the prevalence of academic teasing in a large, diverse and urban district in the Southern United States. Additionally, using Tripod data from 2012–15, this study tests potential predictors and outcomes of academic teasing. Analyses apply hierarchical linear modeling (HLM). Results indicate that some students of color are significantly more exposed to academic teasing than White students, and that academic teasing is a significant predictor of students’ hiding and holding back academic effort. Furthermore, teachers with better teaching skills have less academic teasing in their classrooms, controlling for student body composition. Implications are discussed.

On Educational Philosophy, Civil Rights, and the Schools

In the last few years, the term "quality education" has entered thepopular educational lexicon as signifying a high degree of excellence. More often than not, the term is injected into discourse for polemical purposes, suggesting a determination to reject its putative opposite, "quantity education," or "saturation services." If one may take liberties with a formula of the Marxian dialectic, the expression constitutes a flat denial that there is a critical point whereat quantity is transformed into quality. It is a declaration that wholesale proliferation of educational plant, albeit designed along advanced architectural lines, and elegantly equipped with the most scientific laboratories, gymnasia, auditoriums, lunchrooms and libraries will not suffice to win the seal of quality education. Nor will staffing of these schools with professionally prepared and dedicated teachers, enlightened administrators, qualified specialists in guidance, librarianship, nursing, and the like alter the rating. The crucial element that must be compresent with these other factors is multi-racial or bi-racial composition of student body.

Effective schools, school segregation, and the link with school achievement

ABSTRACTThis study examines whether 3 teacher-rated aspects of school effectiveness differ across school segregation profiles in Stockholm, and to what extent these indicators are associated with the academic achievement of 9th-grade students. Analyses were based on 2 cross-sectional data collections performed in 2014 and 2016, respectively (147 school units), one among teachers (n = 2,024) and the other among 9th-grade students (n = 9,151). Multilevel analysis was applied, estimating 2-level random intercept linear regression models. Results show that teachers’ ratings of school leadership, teacher cooperation, and school ethos, as well as student-reported marks differ across school segregation profiles. Findings further reveal significant associations between these school effectiveness indicators and student performance, even when taking student family background and the school’s student body composition into consideration. In part, these associations are also identified within segregation profiles. Moreover, results show that school ethos acts as a mediator between school segregation profile and student achievement.

Diversifying High Schools in Racially Changing Suburban Districts: Expanding Opportunity, Creating Barriers?

Although demographic change is happening more rapidly at the elementary school level, the intersection of these demographic trends with the changing mission of high schools may offer the opportunity to reduce some of the persistent racial gaps in educational attainment. At the same time, when schools became diverse as desegregation took place, stratification within schools occurred, leading to inequality within diverse schools. Thus, this article seeks to examine whether high schools can help to expand opportunity for low-income students and students of color as suburban racial change occurs. To answer this question, this article draws on school-level interviews in six public high schools in racially changing suburban districts in some of the nation's largest metropolitan areas. High schools in this study focused on ways to provide access to diverse students through structural reforms and information dissemination, yet they also saw academic programs as a way to compete for certain students to shape their student body composition and maintain enrollment.

Uwarunkowania nierówności horyzontalnych w dostępie do szkolnictwa wyższego w Polsce

W artykule przedstawiono wyniki badań nad statusem społeczno-ekonomicznym studentów kilku polskich uczelni różniących się pod względem prestiżu. Starano się w nim odpowiedzieć na pytanie: Co sprawia, że dana osoba wybiera studia na tej, a nie innej uczelni wyższej? Pytanie to ma szczególną wagę w kontekście polskiego systemu szkolnictwa wyższego, co do którego uzasadnione wydają się założenia o zróżnicowaniu jakościowym uczelni oraz wynikającym m.in. z umasowienia kształcenia na tym szczeblu zróżnicowaniu społecznym osób podejmujących studia na poszczególnych uczelniach. Dorobek badań nad nierównościami szans edukacyjnych wyraźnie sugeruje, że studenci uczelni o różnym poziomie prestiżu istotnie różnią się pod względem statusu społeczno-ekonomicznego. Potwierdzenie tej hipotezy w zgromadzonych danych pozwoliło na weryfikację kolejnej: można mówić o istnieniu horyzontalnych nierówności w dostępie do szkolnictwa wyższego w Polsce, czyli sytuacji, w której część osób podejmuje studia na uczelniach o niższym prestiżu z powodów innych niż przygotowanie szkolne (spełnianie kryteriów kwalifikacji). Interesujące przy tym jest nie tyle samo odnotowanie tego zjawiska, ile rozpoznanie jego zakresu oraz wywołujących go czynników, a także ich relatywnej siły. Mające temu służyć badanie ankietowe przeprowadzono w drugim kwartale 2015 r. na populacji polskich studentów I i II roku studiów I stopnia w dziedzinie nauk ekonomicznych na uczelniach publicznych i niepublicznych w Polsce.