Date of Award
2003
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Education
Department
Fischler Graduate School of Education and Human Services
Advisor
Doug Eury
Committee Member
Deborah Wortham
Committee Member
Barbara Packer
Keywords
academic achievement, academic failure, attendance patterns, discipline referrals, Georgia, Jackson County High School, Jefferson, mentors, mentoring program, retention (in school), rural schools, school attendance, school orientation, secondary school students, student improvement, summer academy, summer programs, summer schools, transitional programs, 9th-grade students
Abstract
This study identified and implemented intervention strategies to promote academic success for 9th-grade students at Jackson County High School in Jefferson, Georgia. Jackson County High School is located in rural northeast Georgia and has a student population of 1,400 in Grades 9-12. During the 2001-2002 school year, 57% of the approximately 475 9th-grade students failed 1 or more academic classes. Furthermore, absence rates and discipline violations were significantly higher for that group than for their classmates who did not fail. This study examined the literature relating to 9th-grade academic failure in other settings and suggested proposed strategies designed to identify and alleviate the problem at Jackson County High School.
Intervention strategies delineated for this project included a Mentoring Program to address excessive absence rates and discipline violations and a Summer Academy intended to help students earn class credit. The goal of the project was to decrease failure rates by 5% when comparing Semester 1 to Semester 2. The project resulted in a 13% reduction in failure rates when comparing the 1st semester to the 2nd semester of the 2002-2003 school year and a 16% reduction in discipline referrals.