The Effects of Kentucky's Primary Program on Three Measures of Academic Achievement

In Kentucky, nongraded primary education became a reality under the mandate of the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA) in 1990. Research has produced some anecdotal information on the degree to which schools have implemented the ungraded primary program, but there has been no research to link the implementation of the primary program to student achievement or school improvement. Under the regulations growing from the KERA, schools devised different organizational arrangements for the ungraded classrooms, characterized by developmentally appropriate practices and multi-age, multi-ability classrooms. The variance in how students were configured in the multi-age classrooms continued to be a source of conflict and discussion regarding the nongraded primary school program. This study examined the relationship, if any, between the degree of implementation of the primary program and three measures of student achievement: (1) the Kentucky Instructional Results Information System (KIRIS) Growth Index Score for cycle 3; (2) the KIRIS percent improvement score; and (3) achievement test scores for grade 3. Data were available for 463 of the state's 813 schools with primary education programs. Data show that Kentucky schools are improving, but it is difficult to determine the effects of the primary program. The degree and nature of implementation varied widely; political pressures and teacher and school interpretations of the nature of the changes worked to blur the impact of the primary program. Additional research is clearly needed to determine the impacts of the ungraded primary program. (Contains 7 tables and 25 references.) (SLD)