Ascribing Place: School District Composition Effects on Middle School Literacy Achievement

• In Event: 29.061 - Research on Districts: From Policies and Structures to Leadership

Abstract

The research provided with this paper examines the relationships between district-level school composition variables, literacy achievement, and the geographic variation of these relationships across the state of Missouri. The purpose of this study is to examine whether certain factors have an effect on literacy achievement and whether those relationships vary across space. The study examines these relationships for geographic variation, or stationarity, in order to better understand both which relationships are significant and where those significant relationships occur. This analytical technique, therefore, offers a new and different way of addressing the geographies of opportunity identified in the literature, and therefore creates the opportunity to apply and use achievement data in a new way.

Author

• Elizabeth Thorne Wallington, Missouri Western State University