Racial Discipline Disproportionality in Montessori and Traditional Public Schools: A Comparative Study Using the Relative Rate Index

Brown, Katie; Steele, Aimy S.L.

doi:10.17161/jomr.v1i1.4941

Cited by 29 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…As education researchers demonstrate the continued salience of race on student educational outcomes (Ferguson, 2000;Johnson, 2014;Lewis, 2003;Lewis & Diamond, 2015;Lewis-McCoy, 2014), more recently, scholars are examining the academic, disciplinary, and social justice context of public Montessori's Black and Latino students (Ansari & Winsler, 2014;Banks & Maixner, 2016;Brown & Steele, 2015;Debs & Brown, 2016;Stansbury, 2014;Yezbick, 2007). Such research suggests both opportunities and limitations with public Montessori in racially diverse contexts.…”

Section: Public Montessori and School Diversitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Racial and Economic Diversity in U.S. Public Montessori Schools

Debs

2016

JoMR

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As public Montessori schools rapidly expand through the United States, the question then arises: What population of students do the schools serve? This study presents a new empirical data set examining the racial and economic diversity of 300 whole-school, public Montessori programs open in 2012–2013, where the entire school uses the Montessori Method. While school-choice scholars are concerned that choice programs like Montessori lead to greater student segregation by race and social class, this study finds a variety of outcomes for public Montessori. Public Montessori as a sector has strengths in student racial and socioeconomic diversity, but it also has diversity challenges, particularly among Montessori charters. The study concludes with recommended strategies for public Montessori schools to enroll a racially and economically diverse student body.

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Section: Public Montessori and School Diversitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Racial and Economic Diversity in U.S. Public Montessori Schools

Debs

2016

JoMR

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“…Of course, the question of how Montessori will appropriately educate an increasingly racially and socioeconomically diverse student population is not left to UMS alone (Brown & Steele, 2015;Debs, 2015;Stansbury, 2012). Given the increasing number of public Montessori schools, now is an important time to be engaged in exploring social justice work among administrations and parent communities.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The efforts of national bodies (Hall & Murray, 2011) and researchers (Brown & Steele, 2015;Stansbury, 2012) provide an approach that focuses on students and curriculum. The data from this study provide a system-wide approach to SJE that was successfully launched among administrators and was more nascent in the parent population, suggesting that SJE has a place outside of the classroom as well.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…SJE is a necessary framework for urban Montessori schools to consider because the majority of students within urban schools, as well as the schoolwide Montessori public schools, are students of color (Debs, 2015;Nevarez & Wood, 2007) and are disproportionately affected by race and class inequities within the education system. For example, recent studies highlight racial disproportionality in school discipline in the Montessori classroom (Brown & Steele, 2015;Stansbury, 2012). While the racial disparity was less robust in the public Montessori setting compared to traditional public schools (Brown & Steele, 2015), findings suggest that Montessori education is not immune to how social identities can affect school experiences.…”

Section: Racial Disparities and Montessori Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For example, recent studies highlight racial disproportionality in school discipline in the Montessori classroom (Brown & Steele, 2015;Stansbury, 2012). While the racial disparity was less robust in the public Montessori setting compared to traditional public schools (Brown & Steele, 2015), findings suggest that Montessori education is not immune to how social identities can affect school experiences.…”

Section: Racial Disparities and Montessori Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Social Justice Education in an Urban Charter Montessori School

Banks¹,

Maixner²

2016

JoMR

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Abstract. As the Montessori Method continues its expansion in public education, a social justice lens is needed to analyze its contributions and limitations, given the increase in racial and socioeconomic diversity in the United States. Furthermore, much of the work in Social Justice Education (SJE) focuses on classroom techniques and curriculum, overlooking the essential work of school administrators and parents, whose work significantly influences the school community. The current study applied an SJE framework to the efforts of one urban, socioeconomically and racially integrated Montessori charter school. We examined the extent to which SJE principles were incorporated across the school community, using an inductive, qualitative, case-study approach that included meetings, surveys, focus groups, and interviews. Administrators quickly adopted a system-wide approach, but parents-often color-blind or minimizing of the relevance of race-consistently resisted. Study results imply a continued need for an institutional approach, not solely a classroom or curricular focus, when integrating social justice into Montessori schools.

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Montessori education's impact on academic and nonacademic outcomes: A systematic review

Randolph

Bryson

Menon

et al. 2023

Campbell Systematic Reviews

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BackgroundMontessori education is the oldest and most widely implemented alternative education in the world, yet its effectiveness has not been clearly established.ObjectivesThe primary objective of this review was to examine the effectiveness of Montessori education in improving academic and nonacademic outcomes compared to traditional education. The secondary objectives were to determine the degree to which grade level, Montessori setting (public Montessori vs. private Montessori), random assignment, treatment duration, and length of follow‐up measurements moderate the magnitude of Montessori effects.Search MethodsWe searched for relevant studies in 19 academic databases, in a variety of sources known to publish gray literature, in Montessori‐related journals, and in the references of studies retrieved through these searches. Our search included studies published during or before February 2020. The initial search was performed in March 2014 with a follow‐up search in February 2020.Selection CriteriaWe included articles that compared Montessori education to traditional education, contributed at least one effect size to an academic or nonacademic outcome, provided sufficient data to compute an effect size and its variance, and showed sufficient evidence of baseline equivalency–through random assignment or statistical adjustment–of Montessori and traditional education groups.Data Collection and AnalysisTo synthesize the data, we used a cluster‐robust variance estimation procedure, which takes into account statistical dependencies in the data. Otherwise, we used standard methodological procedures as specified in the Campbell Collaboration reporting and conduct standards.Main ResultsInitial searches yielded 2012 articles, of which 173 were considered in detail to determine whether they met inclusion/exclusion criteria. Of these, 141 were excluded and 32 were included. These 32 studies yielded 204 effect sizes (113 academic and 91 nonacademic) across 132,249 data points. In the 32 studies that met minimum standards for inclusion, including evidence of baseline equivalence, there was evidence that Montessori education outperformed traditional education on a wide variety of academic and nonacademic outcomes. For academic outcomes, Hedges' g effect sizes, where positive values favor Montessori, ranged from 0.26 for general academic ability (with high quality evidence) to 0.06 for social studies. The quality of evidence for language (g = 0.17) and mathematics (g = 0.22) was also high. The effect size for a composite of all academic outcomes was 0.24. Science was the only academic outcome that was deemed to have low quality of evidence according to the GRADE approach. Effect sizes for nonacademic outcomes ranged from 0.41 for students' inner experience of school to 0.23 for social skills. Both of these outcomes were deemed as having low quality of evidence. Executive function (g = 0.36) and creativity (g = 0.26) had moderate quality of evidence. The effect size for a composite of all nonacademic outcomes was 0.33. Moderator analyses of the composite academic and nonacademic outcomes showed that Montessori education resulted in larger effect sizes for randomized studies compared to nonrandomized studies, for preschool and elementary settings compared to middle school or high school settings, and for private Montessori compared to public Montessori. Moderator analyses for treatment duration and duration from intervention to follow‐up data collection were inconclusive. There was some evidence for a lack of small sample‐size studies in favor of traditional education, which could be an indicator of publication bias. However, a sensitivity analysis indicated that the findings in favor of Montessori education were nonetheless robust.Authors' ConclusionsMontessori education has a meaningful and positive impact on child outcomes, both academic and nonacademic, relative to outcomes seen when using traditional educational methods.

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Racial Discipline Disproportionality in Montessori and Traditional Public Schools: A Comparative Study Using the Relative Rate Index

Cited by 29 publications

References 33 publications

Racial and Economic Diversity in U.S. Public Montessori Schools

Racial and Economic Diversity in U.S. Public Montessori Schools

Social Justice Education in an Urban Charter Montessori School

Montessori education's impact on academic and nonacademic outcomes: A systematic review

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