Education

Correction: Harlem Success Academy Students Outscore Peers

By Debra Viadero — June 09, 2010 1 min read
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In an earlier post, I mistakenly linked the Harlem Success Academy to the Harlem Children’s Zone. That is NOT the case. The Harlem Success Academy is part of a separate network called the Success Charter Network, which is headed by Eva Moskowitz. Here is the correct post:

A study out this morning finds that 3rd-grade students enrolled in the Harlem Success Academy outperform peers who applied to the school but failed to win a seat in the lottery.

For the study, researchers Jonathan Supovitz and Sam Rikoon of the University of Pennsylvania’s graduate school of education studied students whose families applied to win a seat in the school’s 2006-07 1st grade class, tracking them through the end of 3rd grade. In math, they found, the Success Academy 3rd graders performed an average of 48 scale-score points higher than counterparts who lost the lottery and ended up in regular New York City public schools. In reading, the Success Academy students’ edge was 35 points.

Compared to demographically similar New York City public school 3rd graders who never applied to the charter school, the score differential favoring Success Academy students was even higher— 58 points.

While the Success Academy schools do have longer school days and years than is typically the case at traditional schools, they do not benefit from the wraparound social services that students in the Harlem Children’s Zone receive, which is what I erroneously reported earlier today.

A version of this news article first appeared in the Inside School Research blog.