An Evaluation of the Strategic Adolescent Reading Intervention (STARI) in Two Urban School Districts during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Autor/in	Somers, Marie-Andree
Titel	An Evaluation of the Strategic Adolescent Reading Intervention (STARI) in Two Urban School Districts during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Quelle	(2023), (116 Seiten)Verfügbarkeit
Zusatzinformation	ORCID (Somers, Marie-Andree)
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; Monographie
Schlagwörter	Quantitative Daten; Urban Schools; School Districts; Reading Instruction; Intervention; Achievement Gains; COVID-19; Pandemics; Middle School Students; Barriers; Reading Skills; Word Recognition; Reading Comprehension; Reading Motivation; Self Efficacy; Student Attitudes; Language Arts; Scores; Grades (Scholastic); Program Evaluation + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Urban area; Urban areas; School; Schools; Stadtregion; Stadt; Schule; School district; Schulbezirk; Leseunterricht; Achievement gain; Leistungssteigerung; Middle school; Middle schools; Student; Students; Mittelschule; Mittelstufenschule; Schüler; Schülerin; Reading skill; Lesefertigkeit; Worterkennung; Leseverstehen; Lesemotivation; Self-efficacy; Selbstwirksamkeit; Schülerverhalten; Sprachkultur; Notenspiegel; Programme evaluation; Programmevaluation
Abstract	The learning losses caused by the COVID-19 pandemic make this an important time to identify strategies that can help students accelerate their learning. The Strategic Adolescent Reading Intervention (STARI) is a year-long supplemental reading intervention that is intentionally designed to address the motivational barriers of middle school students who are reading below grade level. STARI is intended to be used for a full class period (45 minutes minimum), at least three days a week, in addition to their regular English Language Arts class. STARI has a Tier 1 (strong) ESSA evidence rating based on a student-level randomized experiment conducted in SY 2013-14 in a northeastern state, which found that STARI had statistically significant positive effects on students' reading skills, including their word recognition, efficiency of basic reading comprehension, and morphological awareness. To explore the replicability of these results, the effect of STARI was evaluated in 11 middle schools in two urban school districts in SY 2021-22, a school year when instruction was still periodically disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Eligible students were randomly assigned to the STARI class (n=183) or to a business-as-usual elective or reading class at their school (n=215). Students' English Language Arts (ELA) state test scores and their course marks at the end of the program year were obtained from school districts, and students' reading skills and reading motivation and self-efficacy were measured using a reading assessment and survey administered in Spring 2022. In one of the two study districts, the findings are challenging to interpret due to low response rates related to the COVID-19 pandemic; in the other study district, response rates were higher and more balanced across research groups. In that district, students in the STARI group had higher ELA state test scores than students in the control group and the difference between research groups is statistically significant at the 10 percent level (n=154, effect size=0.32, p- value=0.071). Students in the STARI group also had consistently higher scores on subtests of reading skills than students in the control group (n=80, effect size=0.15 to 0.32). Although not statistically significant, the magnitude of these effects mirrors the findings from the prior evaluation of STARI, suggesting that STARI is a promising strategy for helping struggling adolescent readers catch up across different settings, including a time period when instruction was still challenging because of the pandemic. An upcoming large-scale evaluation of STARI will continue to build evidence on its implementation and effectiveness in additional settings and for different subgroups of students. (As Provided).
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2024/1/01