Final Findings from Impact and Implementation Analyses of the Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium
Mokher, Christine G.; Lee, Steve; Sun, Christopher (2016). CNA Corporation. Retrieved from: https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED569930
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examining39,882Students
Practice Guide
Review Details
Reviewed: May 2024
- Practice Guide (findings for Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium )
- Additional source not reviewed because it is not the primary source for the study (View primary source).
This review may not reflect the full body of research evidence for this intervention.
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
Findings
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
Sample Characteristics
Study sample characteristics were not reported.Grant Competition
Review Details
Reviewed: October 2017
- Grant Competition (findings for Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium )
- Quasi-Experimental Design
- Meets WWC standards with reservations because it uses a quasi-experimental design in which the analytic intervention and comparison groups satisfy the baseline equivalence requirement.
This review may not reflect the full body of research evidence for this intervention.
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
Findings
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Probability of enrollment in college by fall semester after end of Grade 12 |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
4 Years |
Grade 9 cohort - 4 years of exposure;
|
N/A |
N/A |
No |
-- | |
|
Probability of enrollment in college by fall semester after end of Grade 12 |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
3 Years |
Grade 10 - 3 years of exposure to intervention;
|
N/A |
N/A |
No |
-- | |
|
Probability of enrollment in college by fall semester after end of Grade 12 |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
2 Years |
Grade 11 cohort - 2 years of exposure;
|
N/A |
N/A |
No |
-- |
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
AP performance (dichotomous) |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
4 Years |
Grade 9 Cohort - 4 years of exposure;
|
11.10 |
8.70 |
Yes |
|
|
|
AP performance (dichotomous) |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
2 Years |
Grade 11 cohort - 2 years of exposure;
|
9.60 |
8.70 |
Yes |
|
|
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Enrollment in college 2 consecutive fall semesters |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
3 Years |
Grade 10 - 3 years of exposure;
|
N/A |
N/A |
No |
-- |
|
Outcome measure |
Comparison | Period | Sample |
Intervention mean |
Comparison mean |
Significant? |
Improvement index |
Evidence tier |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
ACT composite in Grade 12 |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
4 Years |
Grade 9 Cohort - 4 years of exposure;
|
N/A |
N/A |
No |
-- | ||
|
ACT composite in Grade 12 |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
2 Years |
Grade 11 - 2 years of exposure;
|
N/A |
N/A |
No |
-- | ||
| Show Supplemental Findings | |||||||||
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ACT composite score in Grade 11 |
Northeast Tennessee College and Career Ready Consortium vs. Business as usual |
4 Years |
Grade 9 cohort - 4 years of exposure;
|
N/A |
N/A |
No |
-- | ||
Evidence Tier rating based solely on this study. This intervention may achieve a higher tier when combined with the full body of evidence.
Sample Characteristics
Characteristics of study sample as reported by study author.
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1% English language learners -
Male: 52% -
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Tennessee
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Race White 95%
Study Details
Setting
The study sample derives from the state of Tennessee. The intervention group came from 29 public high schools in northeast Tennessee across 15 counties, and the comparison group came from 29 public high schools that had similar characteristics across the state of Tennessee. The intervention was implemented between October 2011 and May 2015.
Study sample
Among schools in both groups, about half of the sample (52%) were male, and the large majority were White (95%), with the remainder from minority groups (5%). More than half of the sample (55%) were free and reduced price lunch eligible. A small percentage (1%) were English language learners and 7% had Individualized Education Plans. The average ACT English, ACT Math, and ACT Science scores for schools in the sample was 20. The average graduation rate for intervention and comparison scores was around 90% (89% for Consortium schools and 91% for matched comparison schools).
Intervention Group
This schoolwide career and college readiness intervention has 6 components: 1) effective management and communication, 2) activities to support a college-going culture, 3) high-quality instruction, 4) access to academically rigorous courses through distance and online technology, 5) expanded opportunities for college-level courses, and 6) resources and services to expand and sustain program capacity. Several stakeholders implement the intervention, i.e., Niswonger Foundation leadership, a College and Career Ready Counselors Team, a Learning Resources Team, a course review team, and a group of online course liaisons. The aim of the intervention is to increase students’ college and career readiness, enrollment in Advanced Placement (AP) courses, performance on AP exams, enrollment in college, and persistence in college. First, i3 leadership provides management and communication, and the College and Career Counselors Team promotes a college-going culture through comprehensive college counseling, college visits, and planning activities. The Learning Resources Team works to improve the quality of instruction through teacher professional development, as well as increases access to courses through distance and online technology, and expands opportunities for college-level courses through AP and dual enrollment programming. Resources and services provide infrastructure to expand and sustain program capacity through maintaining IT services and hardware/software. The intervention was implemented from 2010 to 2015, and outcomes were measured for students in each grade (9th grade, 10th grade, 11th grade, and 12th grade cohorts). The exposure to the intervention varied from 1-4 years.
Comparison Group
The comparison schools in this study did not have access to the college preparation and academic support resources and services of the Consortium; therefore, these schools received services as usual.
Support for implementation
The Niswonger Foundation implemented the Northeast Tennessee Career and College Readiness Consortium with funding from the Investing in Innovation (i3) grant program. Professional development for the Leadership Team, the Career and College Readiness Team, AP teachers, and teachers of core academic content was an integral part of the intervention. The Executive Director and Leadership Team ensured compliance with professional development for the intervention, and the fidelity of implementation for professional development activities was high as a result (p. 41). Networking among Consortium schools was facilitated through each school having a a teacher liaison for online learning; sending or receiving a distance learning course; or having counselors and teachers collaborate in an online forum. The Leadership Team also conducted regular course review meetings in which school and district administrators reviewed Consortia current course offerings and recommended course changes for the upcoming year. The program has a logic model and fidelity can be numerically scored by rating each of the key components on a 3-point scale (low, moderate, and high). The fidelity is rated by an evaluation team. The final score for each component is a weighted average of fidelity scores for all indicators of that component. Components are determined to be "implemented with fidelity” if the weighted average is greater than or equal to 2.5 on a 3-point scale.
An indicator of the effect of the intervention, the improvement index can be interpreted as the expected change in percentile rank for an average comparison group student if that student had received the intervention.
For more, please see the WWC Glossary entry for improvement index.
An outcome is the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are attained as a result of an activity. An outcome measures is an instrument, device, or method that provides data on the outcome.
A finding that is included in the effectiveness rating. Excluded findings may include subgroups and subscales.
The sample on which the analysis was conducted.
The group to which the intervention group is compared, which may include a different intervention, business as usual, or no services.
The timing of the post-intervention outcome measure.
The number of students included in the analysis.
The mean score of students in the intervention group.
The mean score of students in the comparison group.
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Study findings for this report.
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as defined in the
non-regulatory guidance for ESSA
and the regulations for ED discretionary grants (EDGAR Part 77).