This study examined differences in middle school English Language Arts (ELA) proficiency between pre-pandemic (2019) and post-pandemic (2022) assessments to understand the COVID-19 impact on learning, particularly among vulnerable groups. Grounded in adaptive leadership theory, the research focused on free and reduced-price lunch (FRL) and English…

Background: Cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) plays a significant role in health and academic performance in youth. The purpose of this study was to examine the longitudinal relationship between CRF and academic performance from fifth to eighth grade among a large, diverse, and state-wide cohort of students, and to determine the extent to which the…

Background: Middle school victimization and problem behaviors often co-occur, but little is known about patterns of co-occurrence, or how long effects persist into adulthood. Objective: Drawing on general strain theory, this study aimed to identify sex-specific profiles of victimization and problem behaviors during middle school, and their…

Internationally, Out-of-School Time (OST) provision is widely seen as providing professionally-supervised activities through which young people, living in high-poverty contexts, can improve their after-school safety, as well as academic and personal development outcomes. However, even when practical barriers to access are removed, participation is…

Music and the arts are of growing interest in promoting success in school and psychological development of young people in general. However, there are few studies focused on the relationship between music and, more specifically on school engagement of vulnerable students. Thus, this exploratory study aims to understand the perceived impact of…

Discovery City Schools, located in the southern United States, served approximately 8,168 public school students in 15 individual schools during the 2022--2023 school year. After a districtwide consolidation in 2019, Triumph Middle School (TMS) was established as the only middle school in the district and served 1,121 seventh- and eighth-grade…

Among infants and children, family climate (e.g., warmth, cohesion, support) and parent emotion regulation (ER) modeling are found to shape ER development. Few studies have attended to this process during early adolescence, and most have neglected to examine the role of poverty, which creates additional challenges for parents and families. The…

This study examined the impact of knowledge-building curricula on raising reading achievement for students from high-poverty backgrounds. The overall purpose of the study was to contribute to our understanding of curricula that may be effective in closing achievement gaps for students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds compared to…

Poverty in the long run, as the long-term source of pressures, has strengthened the vulnerability of juveniles and has increased the incidence of psychological or behavioral problems during their growth. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen preventive intervention for adolescents to avoid poverty's "scar effect" upon their physical…

This report focuses on the COVID-19 pandemic in the Kalamazoo Public Schools District in Kalamazoo, Michigan, which closed its doors to students from mid-March 2020 to June 2021. During this time, instruction transitioned from face-to-face to virtual, with students having three options for virtual instruction. In addition to individual KPS student…

This dissertation explored the following central question: How can an arts-based learning process positively impact the literacy of adolescent students of color from high-risk and high-poverty communities? In this study, I examined the relationship between a pedagogical approach that incorporates arts-based pedagogies into hands-on,…

In this study, the authors correlate proficiency rates of seventh-grade civics students to free and reduced-priced (FRPL) lunch status during the 2015-2016 school year at the school level, across all 348 Florida schools for which both statistics were applicable and available. The authors used simple linear regression to test the null hypothesis…

As students return to in-person instruction in the 2021-2022 school year, local education agencies (LEAs) must develop resource allocation strategies to support schools in need. Federal programs have provided resources to support restart and recovery. However, there is little consensus on how LEAs can target resources to support those schools most…

As students return to in-person instruction in the 2021-2022 school year, local education agencies (LEAs) must develop resource allocation strategies to support schools in need. Federal programs have provided resources to support restart and recovery. However, there is little consensus on how LEAs can target resources to support those schools most…

Children and adolescents from low-income families now comprise a majority of public school students nationally. As the number of students from low-income backgrounds increases, so does the achievement gap between them and their wealthier peers. This phenomenological qualitative study examined a national sample of high-achieving, low-income middle…