Weakening achievement gap and strengthening school renewal: A multivariate multilevel approach incorporating changes among both students and teachers

Abstract

Using longitudinal data across Grades 3 to 5 on students and teachers from 123 elementary schools, we developed a multivariate multilevel model incorporating changes among both students and teachers to examine the relationship among schools between change in school racial-ethnic gap in academic achievement (English language arts and mathematics) and change in school renewal effort (by school principals). Across Grades 3 to 5, we found statistically significant improvement in school renewal effort, whereas the school racial-ethnic gap in academic achievement was statistically stable. In terms of their relationship, we found that, across Grades 3 to 5, improvement in school renewal effort were weakly correlated with enlargement in school racial-ethnic gap in academic achievement concerning English language arts (correlation = .10). Meanwhile, improvement in school renewal effort were marginally correlated with reduction in school racial-ethnic gap in academic achievement concerning mathematics (correlation = −.18).