Considering District and School Factors and Their Relationship to ACT Performance in North Carolina: An Examination of the ACT Pilot Results

Abstract

Since 2001 several states have adopted the requirement that high school students either take the SAT or ACT to assess high school programs or assist students in accessing post-secondary-educational opportunities. In 2012 the state of North Carolina adopted a new accountability program that included the ACT as a measure of college readiness. Previous research on the relationship between school districts and school level performance found that district size had a role in school achievement. This study looked at how district factors influenced the ACT performance of students across North Carolina in an effort to better understand if there were district factors other than size that may be influencing student performance and how high school reforms, given the influence of district factors is meeting the goal of increasing student college readiness. The results of this study are as follows. (1) District factors are related to school level performance, where student race and parental education levels were found to be significant predictors of achievement, (2) the traditional school level factors of race and student socioeconomic status did significantly predict ACT scores, and (3) as a high school reform model, students attending early college high schools did score higher on the ACT as compared to traditional high schools. District and School Factors Affecting Student PerformanceThe association of school district composition or characteristics and student performance is not well documented and when research is available, district size appears to be the factor most often controlled for. For example, Trani [1] found that as district size increased the performance of students in general declined and when coupled with lowwealth students, the performance of these students declined further. These results run counter to other studies that found increases in school district size was associated with higher levels of student performance [2][3][4][5]. It has been suggested that some of the inconsistency in results seems to be contributable to the methods employed to study the hypothesized relationship (see [1]). Including other variables to enhance the understanding how district factors are associated with student performance are wanting and the application of methodological approaches that reflects the organization or schools and districts that may lead to more consistent findings and findings that can be readily applied to district and school reform efforts. In contrast to the lack of research understanding district factors and student performance, there has been a great deal of research on the relationship between school related factors and student achievement. The research has pointed to the influence of student wealth, race, school size, curriculum, teacher preparation, and other variables that were found to predict a reasonable degree of student outcomes [6][7][8][9][10]. For example, Ma and Klinger, in their study of New Brunswick Schools, found that how student and school factors influenced achievement varied over the ty...

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