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Jennifer Fredricks
Connecticut College
Participation in Structured and Unstructured Activities in After School Hours: Self-Selection and Adolescent Adjustment
FINAL REPORT:
There is a growing interest in the effects of participation in school-based extracurricular activities, like team sports, academic clubs, and the arts, on academic achievement. Prior research has yielded conflicting results, with some studies finding a positive relation between extracurricular participation and achievement and other studies documenting no effects. The strength of the relation between extracurricular participation and academic achievement also varies by type of activity (i.e., sports, arts, academic clubs), methodological design (i.e., cross-sectional versus longitudinal), and the degree of attention to selection factors that may explain why some individuals choose to participate in extracurricular activities and others do not.
In this study, I used data from the Educational Longitudinal Study (ELS:2002) to examine the relation between participation in three types of activities (i.e., academic activities, non-academic activities, and school sports) and a range of academic outcomes (i.e., grades, math standardized tests scores, educational expectations, and educational status) over time. I used propensity score matching, one statistical technique that can help to minimize selection effects, to account for some background factors that are related to extracurricular participation. After including the propensity score as a covariate, I found that participation in each of the three extracurricular domains was positively related to grades, educational expectations, and educational status. In addition, participation in academic clubs was associated with math achievement test scores, but there was no relation between participation in non-academic clubs and sports and achievement scores.
This study uses a stronger methodological design than much of the previous research in the field to show a positive association between extracurricular participation and indicators of academic adjustment. Involvement in school-based extracurricular activities may have academic benefits because it can link youth to supportive adults and peers, it can contribute to school belonging and attachment, and it can improve non-cognitive skills. Conducting methodologically rigorous research on the outcomes of extracurricular participation is especially timely in the current policy climate. In an era of accountability pressures and fiscal constraints, the value of participating in extracurricular activities is being questioned. The results of this study suggest that cutting extracurricular programs is a short-sighted and misguided policy decision.
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