John Fisher College Fisher Digital Publications Education Doctoral Ralph C. School of Education 8-2018 Pipeline to Success Sean Davenport seanldavenport@gmail.com Follow this and additional works at: https://fisherpub.edu/education_etd How has open access to Fisher Digital Publications benefited you? Recommended Citation Davenport, Sean, "Pipeline to Success" (2018). Please note that the Recommended Citation provides general citation information and may not be appropriate for your discipline. To receive help in creating a citation based on your discipline, please visit http://libguides.
This document is posted at https://fisherpub.edu/education_etd/363 and is brought to you for free and open access by Fisher Digital Publications at St. John Fisher College. For more information, please contact fisherpub@sjfc. Pipeline to Success Abstract The purpose of this research was to examine the impact of an educational pipeline on two subsets of students.
The first subset entered the school pipeline in the sixth grade and was continuously enrolled through the 12th grade. The second subset of students entered the school’s pipeline in the ninth grade and was continuously enrolled through the 12th grade. This study measured and compared the resiliency, academic achievement, and attendance of a total of 68 students who attended a public secondary school in a large urban city in the Northeast Region of the United States. An educational pipeline provides the necessary structures whereby a student can get the support he or she needs because the student traveled within the confines of one system as opposed to attending separate middle and high schools.
The pipeline can provide the necessary resources that help cultivate student success and a supportive school environment. The results of this quantitative study showed no significant difference between students who entered the pipeline in the sixth grade and those who entered in the ninth grade across all three variables: resiliency, academic achievement, and attendance. Document Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Education (EdD) Department Executive Leadership First Supervisor Sandye P. Johnson Second Supervisor LaTasha Hamlett-Carver This dissertation is available at Fisher Digital Publications: https://fisherpub.edu/education_etd/363 Pipeline to Success By Sean L.
Davenport Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Ed. in Executive Leadership Supervised by Dr. Johnson Committee Member Dr. LaTasha Hamlett-Carver Ralph C.
School of Education St. John Fisher College August 2018 Copyright by Sean L. Davenport 2018 Dedication There are a lot of people who are responsible for my growth and development as a person and a leader, but it is only appropriate that I begin by acknowledging and thanking my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We had a lot of conversations during this process.
I want to thank my wife, Karyn, and my son, Chandler, for being supportive and encouraging. Thanks for the pep talks. Chandler, you are truly my inspiration. I also want to thank my aunt, Mary Jones, who encouraged (forced) me to attend college after high school and, without her persistence, my educational journey never would have happened, and I am forever grateful.
I also want to thank my parents. Without the two of you, there would be no me. Thank you for always being there. I also want to thank The Reverend Doctor Calvin O.
Thank you for giving up your time to meet with me throughout this journey. I would like to thank my dissertation chair, Dr. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! I would not be here without your unwavering support. My committee member, Dr.
LaTasha Hamlett-Carver, thank you for challenging me to think deeper. Your spirit has been a blessing during this process. Lastly, I want to thank Jocelynne, Melissa, and Merica. We are truly destined for greatness (D4G8ness!).
There are many more people who have been encouraging and inspiring throughout this process, and if I started naming names, I would definitely leave some iii important people out, so just know that I am thankful for having such a large and caring village. iv Biographical Sketch Sean Davenport is currently a Leadership Development Coach for the New York City Department of Education. He has the distinction of having served as a principal on the elementary, middle, and high school levels. Davenport received a Bachelor of Science degree in Mass Communication in 1992 and a Master of Arts degree in Communication in 1995 from Norfolk State University in Norfolk, VA, and he received a Master of Arts degree in Education Administration from Fordham University in 2001.
He began his doctoral studies at St. John Fisher College in the summer 2016 in the Ed. program in Executive Leadership. Davenport pursued his research on school pipelines and the resiliency of African American and Latino students under the direction of Dr.
Sandye Johnson and Dr. LaTasha Hamlett-Carver and received the Ed. degree in the summer of 2018. v Abstract The purpose of this research was to examine the impact of an educational pipeline on two subsets of students.
The first subset entered the school pipeline in the sixth grade and was continuously enrolled through the 12th grade. The second subset of students entered the school’s pipeline in the ninth grade and was continuously enrolled through the 12th grade. This study measured and compared the resiliency, academic achievement, and attendance of a total of 68 students who attended a public secondary school in a large urban city in the Northeast Region of the United States. An educational pipeline provides the necessary structures whereby a student can get the support he or she needs because the student traveled within the confines of one system as opposed to attending separate middle and high schools.
The pipeline can provide the necessary resources that help cultivate student success and a supportive school environment. The results of this quantitative study showed no significant difference between students who entered the pipeline in the sixth grade and those who entered in the ninth grade across all three variables: resiliency, academic achievement, and attendance. vi Table of Contents Dedication. iii Biographical Sketch.
vi Table of Contents. vii List of Tables. ix Chapter 1: Introduction. 7 Statement of Purpose.
9 Potential Significance of the Study. 9 Definitions of Terms. 11 Chapter 2: Review of the Literature. 13 Introduction and Purpose.
30 Chapter 3: Research Design Methodology. 35 vii Instruments Used in Data Collection. 35 Procedures for Data Collection and Analysis. 40 Data Analysis and Findings.
41 Analysis of Research Question 1. 41 Analysis of Research Question 2. 44 Analysis of Research Question 3. 47 Summary of Results.
51 Implications of Findings. 65 viii List of Tables Item Title Page Table 3.1 Independent and Dependent Variables by Specified Hypotheses and Associated Planned Analysis 38 Table 4.1 Descriptive Statistics for Resiliency by Cohort Group 42 Table 4.2 Inferential Statistics for Resilience by Group Status 43 Table 4.3 Descriptive Statistics for GPA, ELA, Algebra, and Readiness by Cohort Group 45 Table 4.4 Descriptive Statistics for Attendance by Cohort Group 48 ix Chapter 1: Introduction The achievement gap still exists in the African American and Latino communities, as their graduation rates and state test scores continue to lag behind Caucasian and Asian students (Camera, 2016). In large urban cities, some students often attend more than one school within the same academic school year. This often contributes to low attendance and poor academic achievement.
In addition, students who experience multiple transitions from elementary to high school find themselves continuously starting over as they adjust to new environments. To better support academic achievement in large urban cities, Ewell, Jones, and Kelly (2003) posited school districts that should consider creating school pipelines. Schools that can support students in an environment with limited transitions are referred to as school pipelines. If school pipelines could be instituted, they would limit the number of times students would transition to a new school, and they could be better supported by being in a familiar environment.
Research suggests that student connections and school engagement are predictive of decreased dropout rates and increased graduation rates among adolescents. One way this happens is by having an engaging, culturally relevant curriculum that creates connections for students to be positively engaged within the school environment, which significantly impacts their performance (Debnam, Johnson, Waasdrop, & Bradshaw, 2013; Hunt et al., 2002; Janosz, Archambault, Morizot, & Pagani, 2008). A way to support this effort is to create school pipelines. The educational pipeline is being viewed 1 as the avenue to increasing a state’s educational capital, which has a direct impact on a state’s economy and quality of life (Ewell et al.
More and more, states are moving toward adopting education policies that will increase the number of students successfully progressing through the K-16 pipeline to a 4-year degree. The educational pipeline analysis conveys the importance of viewing student progress as a continuum from elementary to high school, leading into postsecondary education and through to the completion of a college degree and then entering the workforce (Ewell et al. Stanley and Plucker (2008) suggested that students from troubled backgrounds, primarily minority students and students from low-income families, are less likely to complete high school than their peers, because they become disengaged from school and feel unchallenged. Relatedly, little attention is directed to the resilience of students of color, and consequently, little is known about the protective factors or processes that operate in their daily lives (Wyner, Bridgeland, & Dilulio, 2007).
Educational experiences related to dropouts who struggled academically showed signs of disengagement from school and bad relationships with teachers and peers, which links to lower chances for graduation (Wyner et al. When an African American or Latino student decides to drop out of school, it is usually not an impulsive reaction. There are numerous factors to the process that leads them to this critical decision. When a student does reach this decision, it usually means that the student failed to form meaningful relationships with adults, became disengaged in school, and felt unchallenged (Stanley & Plucker, 2008).
Whatever risk factors students face, there is an inability for them to bounce back from that adversity and finish the process and graduate from high school (Stanley & 2 Plucker, 2008). Wyner et al. (2007) pointed out that when it comes to African American and Latino students, there has not been much attention around their resiliency and the challenges they face in their daily lives. Ernestus and Prelow (2015) found that African Americans and Latinos shared the same patterns of risk and protective factors.
Their study further indicated that when looking at students’ time in school, it is essential to look at them over a process of time rather than at one moment in time. This means that students who are in an environment that can nurture them may not show immediate progress, but they will eventually overcome their adversity over the course of their school career. One thing is sure, educationally resilient students are more likely to have higher reports of school support, higher expectations from adults, higher academic self-esteem, and higher parental monitoring than noneducationally resilient students (Wang & Gordon, 1994). Williams and Portman’s (2014) explanation of resiliency is that it is not just a personality trait that stops the negative environment from influencing children and adolescents, but some of the individuals’ success includes protective factors that allow them to overcome the causes of risk factors (Williams & Portman, 2014).
It has been over 40 years since the Civil Rights Act, and African American and Latino students are still the poorest performing academic group in the United States across all age groups and subject areas (McWhorter, 2000). Understanding resilience and strength among students of color requires acknowledging and recognizing the continuing legacy of oppression and discrimination that affects their daily lives (Bailey & Dziko, 2008). Wilson (2014) stated, “The United States has become a culture of incarceration, removing from society people who present difficult problems, including conditions 3 caused by disability and addiction” (p. This segregation of educational opportunities, which often results in the criminalization of youth of color, is referred to as the school-to-prison-pipeline (Wilson, 2014).