The Bay Area School Reform Collaborative (BASRC, now called Springboard Schools) in San Francisco, California, is a grant-making organization that supports districts' system-wide efforts to improve the quality and equity of student outcomes.
This report discusses the "focal strategy," which targeted six districts in the Bay Area ("focal districts"), beginning in the 2002-2003 school year.
With funding from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, MDRC, a nonpartisan, nonprofit education and social policy research organization, is conducting an independent evaluation of BASRC's focal strategy.
This report, the first of two, analyzes the relationship between the focal strategy and improvements in student achievement.
It compares progress in the focal districts in the first two years of the strategy's implementation to progress in a set of carefully chosen comparison districts in the same area over the same period.
On the other hand, fifth-grade students' performance in the focal districts improved over time, slightly outpacing improvements in the comparison districts in Year 2, but the differences were not statistically significant.
The differences were most evident in reductions in the percentage of fifth-grade students performing below basic levels.
The evident lack of a substantial, pervasive association between the BASRC focal strategy and student achievement may not be surprising given that the strategy primarily targets district leadership and does not specify how reform activities may lead to changes in instruction or to instructional supports.
The BASRC focal strategy has the potential to strengthen district leadership for supporting school improvement, and it may set the stage for stronger systemic improvements that are designed to change instructional practices.
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