Internationals Network for Public Schools’ Educational Impact on Immigrant Youth: The Difference in Attendance

• In Event: Beyond Dreaming: Realizing the Promise of Educational Equity for Immigrant Youth

Abstract

Objectives

The Internationals Network for Public Schools (Internationals) is an educational nonprofit that supports international high schools and academies, dedicated to serving immigrant English Language Learners (ELL) in the US. According to their reports, Internationals Network students graduate more from high school than their peers across the US by four percentage points and enroll in college more by 12 percentage points. This paper seeks to expand more on the positive impacts of INPS by observing the difference in educational outcomes for immigrant and refugee youth who attend the program to those who do not attend. Our paper looks to answer two main questions:

What is the difference in educational outcomes (GPA, high school graduation rate, college enrollment rate) between immigrant and refugee youth who attend the Internationals academy to those who do not attend?

What factors determine which immigrant and refugee youth apply to or attend an Internationals program? Are certain immigrant and refugee groups more likely to attend/not attend the program?

Perspectives
We align our theoretical framework and perspective of the study with the core principles of the Internationals: Heterogeneity + Collaboration, Experiential Learning, Language + Content Integration, Localized Autonomy + Responsibility, and One Learning Model for All. These principles, which place students at the center of learning with collaborative, hands-on projects and a strong language curriculum to meet their needs, have been shown to be effective.

Methods
Our study uses a dataset that contains information of immigrant and refugee students who attended international schools and academies between the years 2014-2022 in two school districts: Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) and West Contra Costa Unified School District (WCCUSD). Propensity Score Matching (PSM) is used to match students who participated in the INPS program to students of similar characteristics and ability but did not participate. Once an ample number of matches are identified, academic outcomes (GPA, course grades, test scores) are measured and compared to determine the difference in treatment effect between the two groups.

Preliminary Findings
Based on the 2023 Internationals Annual Report, students from across all INPS schools graduate from high school at an average rate of 80%. This rate draws closer to the four-year graduation rate in the United States, which was 87% as of 2022.

Significance
Internationals shows great promise in not only addressing the academic and language barriers present for immigrant youth who have recently arrive to the U.S, but could also bring about a new standard of pedagogy and school values that will enable better interaction with these group of students, furthering their development and integration into the U.S education system. This study will enable us to better understand the exact impact this program has on immigrant youth by measuring the exact difference it makes for those who attend in comparison to those who do not attend.

Author

• Hua-Yu Sebastian Cherng, New York University