title: Impact of a social-emotional and character development program on school-level indicators of academic achievement, absenteeism, and disciplinary outcomes: A matched-pair, cluster randomized, controlled trial.
abstract: This paper reports the effects of a comprehensive elementary school-based social-emotional and character education program on school-level achievement, absenteeism, and disciplinary outcomes utilizing a matched-pair, cluster randomized, controlled design. ThePositive ActionHawai'i trial included 20 racially/ethnically diverse schools (mean enrollment = 544) and was conducted from the 2002-03 through the 2005-06 academic years. Using school-level archival data, analyses comparing change from baseline (2002) to one-year post trial (2007) revealed that intervention schools scored 9.8% better on the TerraNova (2nded.) test for reading and 8.8% on math; 20.7% better in Hawai'i Content and Performance Standards scores for reading and 51.4% better in math; and that intervention schools reported 15.2% lower absenteeism and fewer suspensions (72.6%) and retentions (72.7%). Overall, effect sizes were moderate to large (range 0.5-1.1) for all of the examined outcomes. Sensitivity analyses using permutation models and random-intercept growth curve models substantiated results. The results provide evidence that a comprehensive school-based program, specifically developed to target student behavior and character, can positively influence school-level achievement, attendance, and disciplinary outcomes concurrently.
authors.affiliation: Department of Public Health, Corvallis, Oregon, USA.
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Snyder
authors.affiliation: Department of Public Health, Corvallis, Oregon, USA.
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Flay
authors.affiliation: Human Development and Family Studies, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, USA.
authors.forename: Samuel
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Vuchinich
authors.affiliation: Human Development and Family Studies, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, USA.
authors.forename: Alan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Acock
authors.affiliation: Human Development and Family Studies, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, USA.
authors.forename: Isaac
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Washburn
authors.affiliation: Department of Exercise Science, University of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina, USA.
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Beets
authors.affiliation: Community Medicine & School of Public Health, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Kin-Kit
authors.initials: KK
authors.lastname: Li