The National Association of Secondary School Principals has recently completed a survey of middle school students that is very informative. Some of the highlights from the survey:
- 93 percent of students say there is “no chance” that they will drop out of high school and not graduate.
- 83 percent of students know little or nothing about the classes they need to take to graduate from high school.
- Only 32 percent say that they have “quite a bit” or “a great deal” of information about the classes they need to prepare for college.
A summary from the NASSP website appears below, and the following are available from the NASSP website:
- The press release concerning the survey results
- An executive summary of the survey results
- The complete survey report
- A Podcast of an interview with John Nori, NASSP director of instructional leadership resources, on the poll results.
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A Voice from the Middle
Nine out of 10 middle school students (92%) say that it is likely that they will attend college, but nearly 7 of 10 (68%) indicate that they have little or no information about how to choose high school classes that will prepare them for college, according to a nationwide survey of middle level students released by NASSP and Phi Delta Kappa International (PDK). Conducted by Harris Interactive, the "A Voice from the Middle" survey of 1,814 students in grades seven and eight reveals several stark contrasts between students’ educational goals and their beliefs about how they will achieve them. The poll, funded by Lumina Foundation for Education as part of its KnowHow2GO campaign, may be the very first national snapshot of the aspirations and school experiences of middle level students.
“The findings of this poll suggest that the middle grades are a key transition point for students and can determine their future. Policymakers need a renewed commitment on these critical years to help practitioners fulfill the promise of high school graduation and college expressed by the respondents,” stated NASSP executive director Gerald N. Tirozzi.
This survey of seventh and eighth graders reveals these startling findings:
- 93 percent of students say there is “no chance” that they will drop out of high school and not graduate.
- 83 percent of students know little or nothing about the classes they need to take to graduate from high school.
- Only 32 percent say that they have “quite a bit” or “a great deal” of information about the classes they need to prepare for college.
“These poll findings show us that our nation’s middle school students have high hopes for their futures and high expectations for themselves. That is great news,” said William J. Bushaw, PDK executive director. “Our challenge is for us to accept and act on these findings—to help all students succeed in high school so that they graduate prepared for postsecondary education and the jobs of the future.”
The poll highlights the importance of having high-quality caring teachers in our nation’s classrooms. When asked how many teachers have been helpful to them in school, 72 percent indicated that throughout their school career only one to five teachers have been helpful. However, the students polled gave somewhat more positive reactions when asked to rate how well their teachers gave them a chance to learn the subject matter, with slightly over 50 percent (51%) giving a rating of excellent or very good, 41 percent giving a rating of good, and 8 percent giving a poor rating.
Harris Interactive® conducted the middle level student Poll on behalf of the NASSP and PDK from February 14–March 7, 2007, among 1,814 U.S. residents in grades seven and eight. Figures for gender, grade level, race/ethnicity, parents’ highest level of education, region, and urbanicity were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions of seventh and eighth grade students in the population. With pure probability samples of this size, one could say with a 95% probability that the results would have a sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. Sampling error for data based on sub-samples would be higher and would vary. However, that does not take other sources of error into account. This online survey is not based on a probability sample and therefore no theoretical sampling error can be calculated.
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