Evaluation of an Intensive Truancy Reduction Program (CISDRXT) within Communities In Schools (CIS) of the Dallas Region

Edvance Research, in partnership with Communities in Schools of the Dallas Region (CISDR), intends to evaluate an intensive truancy reduction program (CISDRXT) using a randomized control trial of 500 students in five schools over a three year period from January 2016 to September 2019. Existing policies and practices to address truancy have not yielded satisfactory results. The theory of change is that re-engaging truant middle school students in their own learning, and reconnecting with their schools and peers, using behavioral, cognitive and social skill development interventions, delinquent behaviors (bullying, fighting, drug use, truancy, pregnancy, involvement with courts, etc.) will be reduced, short-term student outcomes will be improved (attendance, behavior and course grades), and students will be on track to graduate by the end of 9th grade, thus breaking the “school-to-prison” pipeline. In the longer-term, these individual student successes foster improved school climate/safety for the whole school. The empirical goal of this impact evaluation is to estimate the magnitude of the causal effect of CISDRXT on student outcomes, and study this effect overtime. The effect of CISDRXT on student outcomes will be estimated by the taking difference between the treatment and control group on each average student outcome of interest. It is hypothesized that:
• There will be a statistically significant increase in school attendance for CISDRXT students compared to CISDR students by the end of each school year.
• There will be a statistically significant decrease in behavioral infractions for CISDRXT students compared to CISDR students by the end of each school year.
• There will be a statistically significant increase in reading/ELA course grades for CISDRXT students compared to CISDR students by the end of each school year.
• There will be a statistically significant increase in mathematics course grades for CISDRXT students compared to CISDR students by the end of each school year.
• There will be statistically significantly more CISDRXT-students on-track to graduate at the end of 9th grade compared to CISDR students.
De-identified data sets, and interim and final reports will be submitted to NIJ. The process will include extensive documentation of all data, missing data imputations, constructed variables, dataset descriptions, analytic procedures, and dataset merging guidance. As part of the archiving materials, codebook documents and data documentation will be provided. Scholarly journal articles, practitioner-focused articles, webinars and conference presentations will share results with the broader community.

This project contains a research and/or development component, as defined in applicable law.

ca/ncf