Current Research Projects

The Effect of Subsidized Child Care and Public School Pre-K on the School Readiness and Long-Term Academic Outcomes of Diverse, Low-Income, Urban Preschoolers: The Miami School Readiness Project (MSRP)

This exciting large-scale, university-community partnership, program evaluation, and applied research project involves maintenance and development of the master database for all child-level, classroom-level, child care center-level, and family-level data involved in the Assessment-Intervention Program, sponsored by the Miami-Dade School Readiness Coalition with support from The Children's Trust. In this project, for 5 years (2012-2007), about 58,000 4-year old low-income children (approximately 60% Latino,30% African American, and 10% white/other) attending state-subsidized child care facilities (center-based, family daycares, informal care, and public school pre-k programs) were individually assessed (in English and Spanish) on their cognitive, language, and motor skills at the beginning (PRE) and end (POST) of the school year. Also, parents and teachers rate children's socio-emotional skills and behavior problems at PRE and POST. The children are still being followed longitudinally as they progress through high school in Miami-Dade County Public Schools with a wide variety of school records outcome data available through 12th grade.

Middle and High School Arts Electives Among Low-Income, Ethnically Diverse Students in Miami: Who Takes Them, for How Long, and What are the Academic Outcomes?

Funded by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), this exciting project is examining 1) child, family, and school predictors of low-income minority youth selecting arts elective courses in middle school, and 2) whether youth who take arts courses do better in school than those who do not, controlling for the selection factors identified in #1. Using data from the Miami School Readiness Project, about 32,000 children (60% Latino, 33% Black, 7% White/Other, 85% in poverty) are reaching 6th, 7th, or 8th grade and 20-25% of them are enrolling in some kind of arts elective course (i.e., band, orchestra, choir, drama, dance, art). Predictor variables include child gender, ethnicity, ELL and disability status, initial school readiness, 5th grade GPA and test scores; family size, marital status, maternal education, free lunch and immigrant status; and school size, quality, resources, and ethnic distribution. We will see if arts classes are linked with better outcomes for at-risk youth (GPA, test scores, attendance, retention, suspension, and drop out).

Race, Gender, and Income Differences in Primary Exceptionality Status Over Time

This undergraduate honors thesis uses data from the MSRP to examine changes in primary exceptionality status over time from kindergarten through 12th grade, whilst also examining any differences in initial placement and changes in primary exceptionality pertaining to race, gender and income. There has been conflicting research on whether race or income has a greater correlation to exceptionality placement, as well as contradictory research suggesting both over and under-representation for minoritized individuals with primary exceptionalities. This project will help clarify the degree to which race or income impacts exceptionality placement by measuring both race and depth of poverty. There has been little research examining the changes in and / or between primary exceptionality status over time in grade school, and even less research examining said changes whilst including race, gender, and income as potential contributing factors.

Two-Way (Spanish-English) Immersion Bilingual Education Classrooms: Language of Instruction, Student Engagement, Motivation, Student-Teacher Relationships, and Academic and Language Outcomes for Students

This exciting 3-year project just funded by the Institute for Education Sciences (IES), is examining how the language of instruction used in two-way immersion programs (i.e., 50% Spanish 50% English, 90% English 10% Spanish) in North Carolina K-3rd grade classrooms matters for student learning, engagement and motivation in classrooms and their eventual English and Spanish language outcomes. Also examined is whether DLL student initial language competence in Spanish and English moderate all of the above. This research is in collaboration with Drs. Doré LaForett and Ximena Franco at the FPG center at University of North Carolina. See more info related to this project here.

Pathways for Long-Term Effects of Pre-K in High School

This dissertation uses data from the MSRP to examine the long-term effects of attending ECE, specifically comparing students who attended either public-school pre-K or center-based care between 2002-2007 in Miami-Dade County. While there is evidence that ECE programs across the United States can yield persistent academic, behavioral, and socioemotional advantages through elementary, middle, and high school, the specific pattern of effects differs depending on location, program features, and subsequent educational experiences. This project will build on previous work with the MSRP showing third-grade, fifth-grade, and eighth-grade effects of pre-K programs by assessing similar outcomes in high school. Specifically, we will be testing to see whether public-school pre-K students still outperform their center-based peers on standardized test scores and GPA, along with rates of suspension, absenteeism, retention, and high school graduation/diploma type.

The Impact of Timing of Reclassification for English Language Learners on Advanced Course Taking in Secondary School 

Using the MSRP dataset, this project investigates if timing of English language proficiency for English Language Learner (ELLs) predicts advanced course taking in secondary school. To do this, language proficiency groups will be divided into three categories: Long-term English Learners (LTEL; remained enrolled as an ELL in grade 6), former ELL students (achieved proficiency prior to entering grade 6),and never ELLs who are native English speakers.

The research questions are:
1) To what extent are there group differences (LTEL, vs. former-ELL, vs. never-ELL) in whether they take, and how many advanced courses students take in secondary school.
2) Are the same patterns of group differences above found across all the different levels/types of advanced courses (i.e., adv, honors, AP, pre-IB, IB, DE)?
3) How much does each additional year of remaining in ESOL programs matter for advanced course taking?
4) Are there gender or race differences in the above patterns?

Multiple regression and logistic regression will likely be used to answer these questions.

Early Bilingualism, Later Foreign Language Learning, and Secondary School Outcomes for Autistic Students 

This master's thesis project explores early bilingualism and foreign language learning as both have separately been associated with positive benefits such as increased executive functioning and academic achievement for neurotypical children, but few studies have investigated early bilingualism or foreign language learning for autistic students. The literature that does exist is quite sparse and is limited by several factors such as lack of diversity in samples, lack of control for important relevant variables (e.g. early school readiness), and relying on caregiver/self-report measures or cross-sectional data. Therefore, the current study proposes to investigate if early bilingualism and/or secondary school foreign language course enrollment is associated with better end-of-high-school academic outcomes (i.e. higher GPA and test scores, advanced diploma types) for autistic students in a linguistically and ethnically diverse sample. Using descriptive statistics and hierarchical linear and logistic regressions, foreign language enrollment frequency will be compared across language status (e.g. bilingual, DLL, monolingual) and academic outcomes will be compared across language experiences (e.g. foreign language course enrollment, language status).