supporting schools facing challenging circumstances. policy, research, practice marina pinskaya...

Supporting Schools Facing Challenging Circumstances. Policy, Research, Practice

Marina Pinskaya Sergey Kosaretsky

Isak FruminIrina Grunicheva

National Research UniversityHigher School of Economics

Graduate School of Education

Historical context

SOVIET UNIONSociety

• Low level of social-economic differentiation

Schools•Most schools are the same:

– material resources– teachers’ professional skills– educational services

Territorial attachment of the school

•Homogeneous student population

•High level of equity and equality of educational outcomes

POST-SOVIET ERASociety

•Growing social and territorial inequality

Schools•Variable level of material resources, the quality of staff and educational services

School’s free choice•Students with low socio-economic status are concentrated in a particular group of schools

•Significant variation in the quality of education across schools •Inequality in educational opportunity

High differentiation of schools: low social inclusion

Country PISA social inclusion index

Finland 89,2

USA 70,7

OECD average 74,8

Russia 71,5

Chile 48,6

Высшая школа экономики, Москва, 2013

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Disadvahteged schools have limited resourcesPISA 2011

A simple correlation between schools’ socio-economic background and resources:

Country PISA index of economic, social and cultural status

Percentage of teachers employed full time

Percentage of teachers with higher education

Quality index of school’s resources

Teacher/student ratio

Finland 0,37 0,17 -0,01 0,13 0,08

USA 0,17 -0,42 0,1 0,22 -0,17

Turkey -1,16 0,12 0,04 0,04 -0,26

OECD average

0,0 -0,07 0,15 0,13 0,15

Russia -0,21 0,18 0,31 0,26 0,29

Chile -0,57 -0,04 0,25 0,35 -0,05

No significant correlationDisadvantaged schools are more likely to have better resourcesDisadvantaged schools are more likely to have poorer resources

Methodology

MethodsStatistical analysis: data (60 variables ): •Finance •Equipment•Staff•Performance data•Socio-economic background •Contingent

Field research •School leadership •Instruction practice•School culture (interaction with parents, cooperation, expectations)

During the field research the following methods were used:•the semi-structured interviews (students, teachers, administration, parents, potential social partners ).

Theoretical framework• The model of school effectiveness

(R.Marzano, P.Мortimor),• the model of Professional Learning

Communities (M.Fullan),• theory of social Capital (Coleman,

J.),• the model of school Improvement

(D.Hargreaves).Objectives

• to identify schools with low academic results that need support

• to identify external and internal causes of consistent underperformance of the school

Data base• 1000 schools in 2 regions of RF

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Research

Model of analysis

academic performance

local context

social composition of student body

school resources

4 5

6

2

1 3

Challenging conditions: problematic contingent and limited resources

Average USE score in math in schools and share of students with two parents who have university-level education

Average UES score in Russian in schools and share of highly qualified teachers

Challenging conditions: territorial differentiation

Share of families in which the parents have university-level education and size of settlement

Share of highly qualified teachers and size of settlement

Log population of municipal district

Log population of municipal district

Log population of municipal district

Log population of municipal district

Schools in challenging conditions have consistently low learning outcomes

USE results in dynamics

Socially disadvantaged

Socially safe

Socially neutral

USE 2009 USE 2010 USE 2011 Average for 3 years

MoscowRegion

(Central Russia)

YaroslavlRegion

(Volga Area)Republic of Karelia

(North-West of Russia)

JOINT PILOT PROJECT “PROGRAMS OF SUPPORTING LOW-PERFORMING SCHOOLS WORKING IN

ECONOMICALLY AND SOCIALLY DEPRIVED CONTEXTS”

2010 - 2013

PROJECT ACTIVITIES

Design of School Improvement Programs Professional Collaboration between Schools

Coaching and Consulting of School Teams

Outcomes

• two schools avoid closure• stopping “the leak” of high-performing students to other

schools and students number growth• provision of additional support and resources from local

educational authorities• growing number of school partners• readiness and strong commitment of school teams to

share their experience with other schools facing challenging circumstances

Transmission from Non-effective to Effective Teaching Practices

Changes

Starting Situation (2009)• «We had less than 300 students

in school which was initially built for more than 1000 students”

• “school material and technical facilities were not sufficient for organizing educational process on the needed level – shabby school furniture, gloomy painted walls… the new principal when she came to this school for the first time 4 years ago had an impression as if she plunged in time of 30 years ago»

Actual situation (2013)“Now we have almost 500 students. Pupils do not change schools and we save our contingent”.

“thanks to the activity of our Principal a variety of resources which helped us to improve significantly our material and technical facilities”

“parents attitude to school has changed. On the one hand has happened as their response to new educational environments which we have created within the last years”

(quotations from the interviews with school principles and vice -principles)

Changes

Starting Situation (2009)«the majority of our teaching staff was of low professional competence, their professional self-evaluation was low, they were demoralized and had lost faith in themselves”

Actual situation (2013) “we’ve managed to change teachers’ mentality. And if several years ago our teachers were close, not confident and were shy to say somebody that they work in our school, but today they are proud of it. As most of them are participants and winners of professional contests of different levels. Joining this project has become a powerful impetus for new and new initiatives”

(quotations from the interviews with school principles and vice -principles)

Vladimir Putin: “To ensure socially equal access to education is one of our most urgent national targets”

“In some of our metropolitan areas we face the phenomenon of steady low-performing schools, where there are a lot of children with problems in studies and behavior, with having Russian as a non-native language. Thus school stops functioning as a social lift and starts to reproduce and reinforce social differentiation. Children should not be held hostage to the social or cultural status of their families.

If schools are working in deprived social conditions then they must receive as much of support as lyceums and gymnasiums working with affluent children receive. And this support must be methodical , personnel and financial” (2012)

Research results influence Policy

Presidential Edict (2011): On the basis of existing best practices to form mechanisms, including organizational, management and financial ones, which will ensure high quality of educational programs of general education, regardless of the type of educational institutions

Presidential Decree (2012): Up to the end of 2013 to ensure the implementation of measures to support teachers working with children from socially disadvantaged families

The State Program of the Russian Federation “Development of Education”: Low-performing schools in disadvantages context should get grants on the implementation of special programs aimed at improving educational outcomes of their students and transformation of these schools into effective schools.

Research results influence Policy

• Community Social Advantage Index of schools (summarizes information about the socio-economic status and education of parents and used to compare academic results of schools with similar characteristics and mark schools that need support)

• Road Maps model for regions to support schools in challenging conditions

• Guidance for schools on improvement programs • Training programs for school administrators and school

counselors.

Instruments to support policy

• Measures to support schools working in difficult conditions included:

- The road map for the development of education in 2012-2018 in Russia;

- Education Development Strategy and Development Program (Moscow, Moscow region, Tula Region)

• Low-performance schools received grants for improvement programs (Moscow region, Yaroslavl region, Belgorod region).

Research results influence Policy: next steps

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E-mail:

Marina Pinskaya

m-pinskaya@yandex.ru

Sergey Kosaretskiy

skosaretski@hse.ruNational Research UniversityHigher School of Economics

http://www.hse.ru