Project ACHIEVE was conceived and first implemented at Jesse Keen Elementary School during the 1990-1991 school year as part of a partnership between Principal John Luposello and Dr. Howard Knoff, then a Professor of School Psychology at the University of South Florida.
Located in an inner-city warehouse district, the Jesse Keen’s staff received training in every component of Project ACHIEVE, and they ultimately implemented virtually every facet independently within a site-based management system. Jesse Keen was a full-service school, a Chapter I school-wide school, and it established and staffed a Parent Drop-In Center that provided parent training and outreach services during the 1990s.
Demographically, Jesse Keen’s enrollment was fairly stable during the 10 years of on-site Project ACHIEVE implementation. During this time, the school’s enrollment averaged 650 students, approximately 60% of whom were Caucasian, 30% African-American, and 10% from other minority backgrounds. Jesse Keen’s mobility rate of new and withdrawn students also averaged 72%, and 87% of the student body received federally-funded meals due to family poverty.
Jesse Keen Elementary School’s Project ACHIEVE Results in Brief
During ten years of Project ACHIEVE involvement, longitudinal outcome data were collected. These data were compared to (a) one year (1989-90) of pre-intervention data for comparison purposes, and (b) using a multiple baseline design with the school as the unit of analysis.
Student Discipline Outcomes
Analyses comparing the collected data to the pre-intervention data, and by averaging the ten-year longitudinal data, provided the following results:
- Discipline referrals to the office averaged 6.79 referrals per 100 students for the first five years and 5.33 referrals per year for the last five years, showing a systematic decrease in discipline referrals from the year before the Project began to the 1999-2000 school year.
- Out-of-school suspensions decreased from 9 suspensions per 100 students during the year before the Project began to an average of 6.38 suspensions per 100 students (a 29% decrease).
- Grade retentions decreased from 6 retentions per 100 students to an average of 3.6 retentions per 100 students over the ten-year implementation period (a 47% decrease).
Academic Outcomes
Analyses comparing the collected data to the pre-intervention data, and by averaging the ten-year longitudinal data, provided the following results based on Illinois Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) scores:
- An average of 28.8% of the students taking the ITBS Reading section between 1990 and 1995 scored above the 50th percentile versus 36.33% of the students taking the ITBS Reading section between 1995 to 2000.
- An average of 35.8% of the students taking the ITBS Math section between 1990 and 1995 scored above the 50th percentile versus 40.00% of the students taking the same section between 1995 to 2000.
- An average of 36.3% of the students taking the ITBS Language section during the first five years of the Project scored above the 50th percentile versus 42.2% of the students taking the same section between the last five years.
School Climate Outcomes
Relative to school climate, three different instruments were completed by the Jesse Keen staff to evaluate changes in the building’s climate before Project ACHIEVE's start-up in August, 1990, and four years later (in August, 1994). The following areas were evaluated: Safe and Orderly Environment, Student Time on Task, Clear School Mission, Home-School Relations, High Teacher Expectations, Instructional Leadership, Staff Morale, Smooth Administration, Race Relations, Building Resources, and High Expectations for Students.
Summing the data by scale and rating the school’s positive school climate using a five-point scale from 1-Excellent to 5-Poor, the teachers’ average changed, over the first four years of Project ACHIEVE implementation, from:
- 2.38 to 2.09 for The Effective Schools Survey
- 2.62 to 2.43 for The Effective School Battery
- 2.21 to 1.82 for the Profile of a School scale
Special Education Outcomes
Analyses comparing the collected data to the pre-intervention data, and by averaging the ten-year longitudinal data, provided the following results:
- A drop in the number of special education referrals from 10 referrals per 100 students in the school to an average of 3.9 referrals per 100 students (a 61% decrease).
- A decrease in special education placements from 6 placements per 100 students during the baseline year to an average of 2.6 placements per 100 students (a 57% decrease).
- A 16% decrease in the number of discipline referrals to the principals office from 73 referrals per 100 students to an average of 61 referrals per 100 students.
Relative to trends in these data:
Special education referrals averaged 3.68 referrals per 100 students for the first five years of the Project (1990-1995) and increased only slightly to 4.10 referrals per 100 students during the next five years (1995-2000).
- Special education placements averaged 2.52 placements per 100 students for the first five years of the Project and 2.73 placements per 100 students for the next five years.
Parent Involvement Outcomes
Relative to parent involvement, Jesse Keen established a Parent Drop-In Center as part of Project ACHIEVE during the 1992-1993 school year. During its first year, a parent intervention program was conducted at the Parent Drop-In Center for parents whose children were having behavioral difficulties in their regular classrooms.
After three-months of “school support and parent discipline and behavior management” classes:
- 100% of the parents and 82% of the teachers reported a significant decrease in the number and intensity of behavior problems in the target children and students.
- All of the parents increased their knowledge in the content areas of the classes from 10-20% from the beginning to the end of the three-month program.
- 82% of the parents agreed or agreed strongly that their relationship with their children had improved.
- 91% of the parents agreed or agreed strongly that they had better control of their children as a result of training.
- 100% of the parents rated the classes as helpful or very helpful in improving their parenting skills.
- Twice as many target as control students improved in their behavior as a result of parent participation in the Drop-In Center program.
- Target and control students maintained similar levels of academic development, as measured by report card grades.
