| Robert Crosnoe
University of Texas at Austin
Poverty, famiily processes, and the transition to elementary school
FINAL REPORT:
1. Crosnoe, Robert and Carey E. Cooper. Poor children's transitions into elementary school: Considering families, focusing on policy.
The debilitating effects of poverty on education fuel the intergenerational transmission of inequality. One long-range method of alleviating poverty in the United States, therefore, is to target the mechanisms by which it disrupts early school experiences. In this study, we pursue this goal by using a core developmental perspective-the family process model-to organize analyses of the nationally representative Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K).
This specific aims of this study were three-fold: 1) to gauge the extent to which poor children lagged behind their peers in academic achievement and socioemotional adjustment during the transition into elementary school, 2) to examine whether these poverty effects were filtered through family dynamics, and 3) to link these family risks to school structures that were both protective and policy amenable. Nearly 18% of the 11,126 ECLS-K children met the federal definition of poverty. Multilevel models revealed that these children scored significantly lower than their peers on standardized math/reading tests and significantly higher on teacher-reported internalizing/externalizing scales during kindergarten, with both differences widening by third grade. These poverty gaps in achievement and adjustment were primarily explained by co-occurring socioeconomic circumstances. A smaller portion (10-40%) was explained by family processes (parents' depression and lower school-based involvement) and an achievement-adjustment feedback loop. Importantly, these risks were less pronounced in schools with stable teaching staffs, literacy/parenting education classes for parents, parent outreach programs, and, at least for the period covering kindergarten through third grade, higher-order instructional strategies.
Thus, the results of this inter-disciplinary, theoretically-grounded, policy-oriented research suggest that links among poverty, parents' mental health/educational involvement, and children's academic and socioemotional functioning early in elementary school represent a pathway in the intergenerational transmission of poverty. This pathway, in turn, may be combated by increasing the provision of family services and developmentally-appropriate pedagogies within stable school environments.
2.Cooper, Carey, Robert Crosnoe, Marie Suizzo, and Keenan Pituch. ÒPoverty, Race/Ethnicity, and the Involvement of Parents in Early Education.Ó
This study applied a family process model to children's achievement during the transition to elementary school. Multi-level models of data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study - Kindergarten Cohort (n = 11,049) revealed that the school-based involvement of parents mediated the association between family poverty and children's math and reading achievement in kindergarten. Further, within-race/ethnicity analyses revealed that this mediation only occurred in White families. Home-based involvement predicted kindergarten achievement in African American, Latino/a, and White families, but this form of involvement did not serve as a mediator for any racial/ethnic group.
3. Crosnoe, Robert. ÒFamily-School Partnerships, Early Learning, and Socioeconomic Inequality.Ó
Wide-spread policy interest in parental involvement in education necessitates a deeper understanding of how families and schools can partner together to promote learning and reduce inequality. Matching developmental theory to a nationally representative sample of American children, this study found that both engaged partnerships (in which school personnel and parents reached out to each other) and symmetrical partnerships (in which parents and teachers constructed parallel learning environments) were associated with greater reading gains during the early years of elementary school. The latter were also associated with reduced socioeconomic disparities in such gains in the years subsequent to the kindergarten transition.
4. Crosnoe, Robert. ÒFamily-School Partnerships and the Transition of Targeted Populations into High School.Ó
This study examined how math/science coursework during the transition from middle to high school varied as a function of partnerships among parents, middle school personnel, and high school personnel, with a special interest in two populations targeted by No Child Left Behind: low-income students and low English proficient students. Multilevel modeling of nationally representative data indicated that two- or three-way ties among families and schools were associated with higher-level math/science course-taking at the start of high school, net of numerous factors (e.g., middle school achievement) selecting students into such family/school configurations. Income-related course-taking disparities were narrower among students whose parents were connected to both their sending and receiving schools. Language-related disparities were narrower among students with fully triangulated family/school partnerships.
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