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FALL 2010
Four world-renowned social science
experts will be speaking as part
of the Center’s 2010-2011 Sulzberger
Distinguished Lecture Series. The
speakers include education expert John
Q. Easton; Kelly Brownell, a leader in
research on obesity and health policy;
early childhood expert Joan Lombardi;
and social epidemiologist Ichiro Kawachi.
Easton began the series September
22 with a talk entitled “Out of the
Tower, into the Schools: How Relevant
Research Can Transform School
Practice and Shape Education Policy.”
On October 28, Brownell presents
“Bold Actions to Reduce Childhood
Obesity.” The series continues in
2011 with Lombardi’s talk on March 1:
“Early Childhood 2011 - Policies for the
Next Generation.” Kawachi completes
the series on April 5 with his lecture
“Income Inequality and Population
Health. Dispatches from a Contested
Field of Research.”
The lectures are held from 3 to
4:30 p.m., with a reception following.
The events, which are free and open
to the public, take place in the Rhodes
Conference Room of the Sanford
School of Public Policy building, 201
Science Drive, on Duke’s West Campus.
The Center for Child and Family
Policy sponsors the Sulzberger
Distinguished Lecture Series to
enhance the intellectual community
not only for its own faculty, research
scientists and staff, but also for Duke
University broadly, Durham and the
entire region. All of the speakers are
world-renowned experts who have
demonstrated unrivaled excellence in
behavioral science and theory, as well
as in science-to-policy applications.
John Q. Easton is director of
the Institute of Education Sciences
(IES) at the U.S. Department of
Education. He began his six-year term
as director in June 2009. The IES is
the nation’s engine for educational
research, evaluation, assessment
and statistics, funding hundreds of
research studies on ways to improve
academic achievement, conducting
2010-2011 Sulzberger Distinguished Lecture Series by Erika Hanzely-Layko
2 Message from the Director_____________________________________
4 Research_____________________________________
5 Teaching_____________________________________
8 Policy_____________________________________
12 Service_____________________________________
13 Announcements_____________________________________
14 Faculty and Researcher News_____________________________________
16 Publications_____________________________________
18 Presentations
Continued on page 3
Donald Barringer, NCCU Teaching Fellows Program Director; Ethan Smith, Matthew West, Monique Smith, Dietrich EsDorn, Donovan Harbison – NCCU Junior and Senior Teaching Fellows – pictured with John Easton.
2 Fall 2010
From the Director
Dear Colleagues, Being a faculty member at Duke is a pretty wonderful lot in life. Each day brings us opportunities to interact with and learn from some of the most creative minds in all of child and family policy. This issue of Bridge focuses on education policy and reports just a few of the many faculty activities that we get to hear about on a regular basis.
We like to think that we have assembled the most outstanding group of scholars in education anywhere outside of a school of education. Being at a university that does not have a separate school of education might actually encourage the strong multi-disciplinary scholarship that our faculty members exemplify. Our contributions are directed toward solving difficult problems in contemporary education and schooling, rather than being driven and bound by professional constraints and interests.
One important problem concerns policies about the use of standardized achievement tests that are mandated by the federal No Child Left Behind Act. Do these test scores validly indicate progress toward important outcomes in human capital, such as high school graduation, post-secondary education, labor market participation, early child bearing, delinquency, and criminal activity? Although test scores modestly predict student outcomes, the impact is not as strong as current policies would suggest, and other factors play important roles in student development. Financial support from the Smith Richardson Foundation enables our faculty members to investigate these questions using data from the 1.4 million students and 100,000 teachers in North Carolina public schools that have been linked in various ways to other administrative data sets. These data sets have been archived at our Center for Child and Family Policy under the leadership of Clara Muschkin. Read about her in this issue.
The data sets for this faculty work group are managed with the expertise of Kara Bonneau, Dorothyjean Cratty, and Sharon Eatmon. The faculty group is led by Charlie Clotfelter, and Duke participants include Liz Ananat, Phil Cook, William “Sandy” Darity, myself, Anna Gassman-Pines, Christina Gibson-Davis, Helen “Sunny” Ladd, Clara Muschkin, Seth Sanders, and Jake Vigdor.
In this issue, a policy report co-authored by one of our senior faculty members, Ladd, is highlighted and addresses an important question: Should student test scores be used to evaluate teacher performance and effectiveness?
Another important problem concerns
suspension policies for student misconduct. With funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, faculty members at the Center’s Transdisciplinary Prevention Research Center, directed by psychologists Phil Costanzo and Rick Hoyle, are examining basic questions about the causes and consequences of student misbehavior, such as: How do genes and early adverse environments interact to lead to antisocial behavior? (By the way, with Avshalom Caspi, Jane Costello, Ahmad Hariri, and Terrie Moffitt on board, the world’s leading group of scholars on this topic is here at Duke.) What role does early truancy play in the pathway toward ultimate school dropout? (With Phil Cook leading a group on this question, major headway is being made.) What interventions are efficacious in preventing student misbehavior? And what school policies about suspensions and expulsions are most effective? In this issue, we highlight the activities of Center staff members in bringing scientific knowledge about these questions to policy makers. Jenni Owen, Joel Rosch, Clara Muschkin, and Anne-Marie Iselin recently led the annual Family Impact Seminar on this topic for the North Carolina State Legislature, and Jenni Owen teamed up with a local elected member of the Durham Public Schools Board of Education, Heidi Carter, to produce an op-ed piece on this topic.
Unfortunately, this issue of Bridge has room enough to describe only a small sampling of the full activities of Center faculty members in education policy. We were not able to report the research by Nicholas School of the Environment economist Marie-Lynn Miranda on the effects of exposure to lead on student academic achievement… or the op-ed piece by Bill Wilson and Cindy Kuhn that ran in newspapers across North America on using health education curricula to help students “take care of their brain” … or research by David Rabiner documenting the use of pharmacologic stimulants by college students to improve their academic performance… or the research by Beth Gifford, Lisa Berlin, and Leslie Babinski evaluating the impact of the national group America’s Promise Alliance on stimulating policies to improve high school graduation rates… or evaluation of school-based interventions to improve academic success for learning disabled students by Christina Christopoulos, David Rabiner, Liz Snyder, and Nicole Lawrence, or… more later.
Philip Costanzo
Associate Director for Mentoring and Teaching
E. Jane Costello
Associate Director for Research
Rick Hoyle
Associate Director for Data Services
Clara Muschkin
Director of CCS Certificate Program
Jenni Owen
Associate Director for Policy and Translation
Barbara Black Pollock
Associate Director for Administration
David Rabiner
Associate Director for Program Evaluation Services
Kenneth A. Dodge
Director, Center for Child and Family PolicyWilliam McDougall Professor of Public Policy and
Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience
3www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
2010-2011 Sulzberger Distinguished Lecture Series Continued from page 1
large-scale evaluations of federal
education programs, and reporting a
wide array of statistics on the condition
of education. Throughout his career,
Easton has directed rigorous projects
aimed at providing the best evidence
about what it takes to spark meaningful
policy debate and sustained change in
urban schools. In 1990, Easton was a
founding member of the Consortium
on Chicago School Research (CCSR)
at the University of Chicago, a
research organization whose mission
is to rigorously analyze the policies that
govern Chicago Public Schools. For two
decades, he was a key member, and
eventually director, of the consortium
as its research guided policies for
Chicago’s schools and districts around
the country. Easton is the author or
coauthor of numerous reports and
articles, and two books: Charting
Chicago School Reform: Democratic
Localism as a Lever for Change and
Organizing Schools for Improvement:
Lessons from Chicago.
Kelly Brownell is a professor in
the Department of Psychology at Yale
University, where he also serves as
professor of epidemiology and public
health and as director of the Rudd
Center for Food Policy and Obesity. His
research deals primarily with obesity
and the intersection of behavior,
environment and health with public
policy. In 2006 Time magazine listed
Brownell among “The World’s 100
Most Influential People” in its special
Time 100 issue featuring those “...
whose power, talent or moral example
is transforming the world.” He was
cited as a “moral entrepreneur” with
special influence on public discourse
in a history of the obesity field and was
cited as a leading “warrior” in the area
of nutrition and public policy. Brownell
has advised members of congress,
governors, world health and nutrition
organizations and media leaders on
issues of nutrition, obesity and public
policy. He has published 14 books,
including Food Fight: The Inside Story
of the Food Industry, America’s Obesity
Crisis, and What We Can Do about It,
which he wrote with Katherine Battle
Horgen, and more than 300 scientific
articles and chapters.
Joan Lombardi, a national and
international expert on early childhood,
is deputy assistant secretary and inter-
departmental liaison for Early Childhood
Development for the Administration
for Children and Families (ACF) under
the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services. Lombardi was
founding chair of the Birth to Five
Policy Alliance and, prior to that,
served during the 1990s in ACF as
deputy assistant secretary for policy
and external affairs, the first associate
commissioner of the Child Care
Bureau, and the project director of the
Secretary’s Advisory Committee on
Head Start. She has been an advisor
on early childhood development to
a number of organizations, including
the Buffett Early Childhood Fund, the
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
and UNICEF. Lombardi is the author of
Time to Care: Redesigning Child Care to
Promote Education, Support and Build
Communities, and co-editor of A Beacon
of Hope: The Promise of Early Head Start
for American’s Youngest Children.
Ichiro Kawachi is professor of
social epidemiology and chair of
the Department of Society, Human
Development, and Health at the
Harvard School of Public Health.
He is also the director of the Harvard
Center for Society and Health. Kawachi
has studied the social determinants
of population health and health
disparities. For the past decade he has
been conducting investigations on
the damaging health consequences
of growing inequality, summarized in
the book, The Health of Nations (with
Bruce Kennedy). Kawachi has taught
internationally, in Australia, Mexico,
Chile, Taiwan and New Zealand. He
is a member of the research advisory
committee of the Pan-American Health
Organization/WHO and serves as the
senior editor (Social Epidemiology) of
the journal Social Science & Medicine, as
well as Editor pro tem of the American
Journal of Epidemiology. t
_____________________________________
The Sulzberger Distinguished Lecture
Series, begun in 2006, is endowed by
the Arthur Sulzberger Family.
For more information or to register, call
(919) 613-9350, e-mail ehlayko@duke.
edu or visit www.childandfamilypolicy.
duke.edu.
Erika Hanzely-Layko is the Center’s
meeting and event coordinator.
BrownellEaston KawachiLombardi
4 Fall 2010
Student test scores are not reliable
indicators of teacher effectiveness,
even with the addition of value-added
modeling (VAM), according to a new
Economic Policy Institute report.
Though VAM methods have allowed
for more sophisticated comparisons
of teachers than were possible in
the past, they are still inaccurate, so
test scores should not dominate the
information used by school officials
in making high-stakes decisions
about the evaluation, discipline and
compensation of teachers.
Among the 10 co-authors of
the report, Problems with the Use
of Student Test Scores to Evaluate
Teachers, is Helen F. Ladd, Edgar T.
Thompson Distinguished Professor
at the Sanford School of Public Policy
and president-elect of the Association
for Public Policy Analysis and
Management.
The Obama administration has
encouraged states to adopt laws that
use student test scores as a significant
component in evaluating teachers, and
a number of states have done so. The
Los Angeles Times recently used value-
added methods to evaluate teachers in
the Los Angeles Unified School District
based on the test scores of its students,
and Secretary of Education Arne
Duncan supported the paper’s decision
to publicly release this information,
asserting that parents have a right to
know how effective their teachers are.
The conclusions of the EPI report
suggest that the Times’ analysis,
which attempts to analyze teacher
effectiveness, is unreliable and
inaccurate. The co-authors make clear
that accuracy and reliability of analyses
of student test scores, even in their
most sophisticated form, are highly
problematic.
Analyses of VAM results show that
they are often unstable across time,
classes and tests. Thus, test scores,
even with the addition of VAM, are
not accurate indicators of teacher
effectiveness. Student test scores
cannot fully account for the wide
range of factors that influence student
learning, particularly the backgrounds
of students, school supports and the
effects of summer learning loss. As a
result, teachers who teach students with
the greatest educational needs appear
to be less effective than they are.
Furthermore, VAM does not take into
account nonrandom sorting of teachers
to students across schools and students
to teachers within schools.
The authors point to other negative
consequences of using test scores
to evaluate teacher performance:
Teachers have an incentive to “teach
to the test;” incentives to collaborate
within schools are reduced; and
teacher morale can suffer.
The authors conclude that,
“Although standardized test scores of
students are one piece of information
that school leaders may use to make
judgments about teacher effectiveness,
test scores should be only a small
part of an overall comprehensive
evaluation.”
The report’s co-authors are:
Eva L. Baker, Paul E. Barton, Linda
Darling-Hammond, Edward Haertel,
Helen F. Ladd, Robert L. Linn, Diane
Ravitch, Richard Rothstein, Richard J.
Shavelson and Lorrie A. Shepard. t
___________________________________
Reprinted by permission. For complete
version see Education Policy Institute.
Contact: Phoebe Silag or Karen Conner,
news@epi.org, (202) 775-8810
Education Experts Caution Against Reliance on Test Scores in Teacher Evaluations
Student test scores cannot fully account for the wide
range of factors that influence student learning, particularly the
backgrounds of students, school supports and the effects of summer
learning loss. As a result, teachers who teach students with the
greatest educational needs appear to be less effective than they are.
RESEARCH
Ladd
5www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
Clara Muschkin, an Interdisciplinary Scholar by Nancy E. Oates
An interdisciplinary scholar, Muschkin appreciates the
cross-disciplinary nature of the certificate program . . .
TEACHING
Clara Muschkin sums up the
popularity of the cornerstone course
for the Children in Contemporary Society
certificate program this way: Everyone’s
been a child; many will have children;
all will go to school.
Add to that the increased scrutiny of
where scarce public sources are invested
in this tight economy, and it’s no wonder
the course she created and teaches fills
up so quickly each semester.
“Many Duke students are going to be
policymakers in one realm or another,”
Muschkin said. “At some point in their
future, this program or course will
make a difference.”
Muschkin, assistant research
professor of public policy at the
Sanford School of Public Policy,
took over in July as director of the
interdisciplinary certificate program
that began in 2007. She adds that
title to the directorships she already
holds in the undergraduate education
program at the Center for Child and
Family Policy and the North Carolina
Education Research Data Center.
“Duke is so fortunate to have
Professor Muschkin’s leadership in
undergraduate education. She is
crucial to the success of our students,”
said Ken Dodge, director of the Center
for Child and Family Policy.
In creating the program’s
cornerstone course (CCS 150/PubPol
124), Muschkin looked at the social/
institutional context in which children
live and how that influences their
lives. The class examines what defines
childhood across history and how
that definition varies in different parts
of the world. Participants debate the
cutoff age or maturity benchmark
in the transition from childhood to
adulthood and consider how the
economic value of children influences
children’s circumstances, family
formation and the resources a society
will invest in children.
An interdisciplinary scholar,
Muschkin appreciates the cross-
disciplinary nature of the certificate
program, as well as the program’s
opportunity to conduct in-depth
research, which many students
develop into their senior honors thesis.
The program draws students from
a variety of specializations, including
psychology, public policy, pre-med,
English, engineering and sciences.
Sarah Rabiner ’10 was one of the
10 students to earn the certificate
in May and now is a teaching fellow at
Citizen Schools, a national nonprofit
that provides a “second shift” of
educators targeting high-risk students
in low-income communities. Rabiner
was impressed by the breadth of
Muschkin’s knowledge behind her
gentle demeanor and her dedication
to her students’ success.
“For a while, while I was working
on my thesis, we met every week, and
I wasn’t even her student anymore,”
Rabiner said. “She always asked the
right questions. Her approach was to
steer you along the right path while
making you feel it was your doing.”
“She opened my eyes to what I
wanted to do,” Rabiner continued.
“You walk out of her class, and you’re
super-stimulated; you have a lot to
talk about on the walk to dinner.”
Muschkin’s Duke roots run
deep. Except for a couple of brief
forays elsewhere, she has been at
Duke since her days as a doctoral
student in sociology. She accepted
a postdoctoral fellowship at Duke’s
Center for Demographic Studies in the
epidemiology of aging, then a research
position in demographic studies. In
2002, she joined Duke’s Center for Child
and Family Policy and in 2008 joined the
Sanford School of Public Policy.
In her research, Muschkin uses
large administrative data files to
examine how policies can influence
individual student outcomes. She has
studied whether sixth grade should be
part of middle school or elementary
school and whether parents in North
Carolina schools react with white flight
to increased Hispanic immigration.
She has researched enrollment and
success in community colleges and
the relationship between school
experience and criminal convictions.
“The more educated people are about
the relationship between a policy and the
outcome on individuals,” Muschkin said,
“the more likely it is that resources will
be used efficiently.” t
Muschkin
6 Fall 2010
Youth, Crime and Public Policy (CCS 49S)Instructor: Joel Rosch, Senior Research Scholar
First-year seminar for students
interested in learning more
about public policies dealing
with crimes committed by
young people. This course uses
crimes as a focus to introduce
students to the variety of
issues involved in child and
family policy. Students will
learn about juvenile crime, the
criminal justice system, how public policy is made, what
different kinds of research tell us about juvenile crime, and
the role of research in the policy making process. Students
also learn about: 1) how juvenile crime policy is impacted
by different kinds of societal values; 2) how the nature and
“causes” of criminal behaviors are understood; and 3) the
kinds of resources and technologies different societies have
at their disposal. t
Children in Contemporary Society (CCS 150/PubPol 124)Instructor: Clara Muschkin, Assistant Research Professor of Public Policy Studies; Director, Children in Contemporary Society Certificate Program
What does it mean to be a child in the 21st century? Using an
interdisciplinary approach, this course provides an overview
of issues facing today’s youth, from childhood through
adolescence. Students begin by exploring social forces
that shape the definition of childhood across place and time
and review how different disciplines study children. They then
consider the many social contexts of childhood, including
the family, schools, the economy, the media and the
dynamics of race and gender. One of the objectives of this
course is to gain an understanding of issues of childhood
adversity—including poverty, violence, delinquency
and health inequities—and how some public policies
are addressing these issues. In fall 2010, students have the
opportunity to participate in a research service learning
component coordinated by the Hart Leadership Program.
Participation in the service learning component is optional.
This course is required for students working on the Children
in Contemporary Society certificate. t
Multidisciplinary Approaches to Contemporary Children’s Issues (CCS 210SA/PubPol 210SA/Psy 210SA)Instructor: Phil Costanzo, Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience
Two-semester course during which students will identify
a problem facing children in contemporary society and
learn how to analyze its historical, political, economic,
psychological and sociological contributions. They will
learn how to conduct a policy analysis and translate their
scholarship to policy solutions. In addition, students will
learn how to present their analyses in oral, academic and
lay-public forums. Capstone course required for the Children
in Contemporary Society Certificate program. t
Fall 2010 CoursesTEACHING
Rosch
Muschkin
Costanzo
“Our Center is committed to
involving Duke students in the
scholarly research it conducts,”
said Ken Dodge, director of the
Center for Child and Family Policy,
“and the students benefit by their
involvement in cutting-edge research.
We are fortunate to have such well-
qualified fellows this year.”
These fellowships are made
possible through generous donations
by the Sulzberger family, which has
made significant contributions to
society through publishing The New
York Times and is now contributing
to the development of outstanding
scholars in child and family policy,
and by Dan Levitan, a 1979 Duke
graduate and co-founder of Maveron,
a Washington State-based venture
capital firm. t
Sulzberger Family and Dan Levitan Social Policy Graduate Research Fellowships
TEACHING
The Center for Child and Family Policy selected five doctoral students as graduate
research fellows for 2010-11. The fellowships encourage the career development
of promising students who are interested in academic careers that blend basic social
science with public policy.
The 2010-2011 Sulzberger/Levitan Social Policy Graduate Research Fellows are: Erin Kim public policy studies Dimitri Putilin psychology and neuroscience Maeve Gearingpublic policy studies Kate Snyderpsychology and neuroscience Amy Sanchez (not pictured)psychology and neuroscience
Making Social Policy (CCS 270S/PubPol 234S/Soc 234S)
Instructor: Jenni Owen, Associate Director for Policy and Translation and Director of Policy Initiatives
Looking at a range of social
policy issues, this course
focuses on 1) the policymaking
process; 2) the role of different
sectors in policymaking (public,
non-profit, etc.); 3) when and
why policymakers use research – and when and why they
don’t; and 4) communicating with policymakers. The course
exposes students to current social policy challenges stemming
from health and human services, education and other
domains. Readings include research, policy and practice
articles and analyses from multiple disciplines. Experiential
and written exercises will help students develop skills for
using research to inform policy and practice. The course
includes visits from policymakers and visits to policymaking
“events,” student work that combines policy and research
considerations; and the potential for students to contribute
useable insights to policymakers and others. Students will
learn about the value of research in informing policy and
the constraints within which policymaking occurs. They will
complete independent and group assignments that combine
their knowledge from the readings with their observations
of “live” policy events. t
Owen
7www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
8 Fall 2010
“Stimulating” and “relevant”
best describe the 2010 North
Carolina Family Impact Seminar held
at the North Carolina legislature on
April 27. The seminar focused on
school suspension policy—an issue
that has recently received media
attention, in part due to North Carolina
having the third highest rate and
fourth highest number of K-12 school
suspensions in the nation. Addressing
the issue is a priority for legislators,
education leaders, and a range of
other stakeholders because of the
impact suspension has on academic
achievement and future employment.
Seminar attendees included legislators,
legislative staff, executive branch
officials, representatives of child- and
family-serving nonprofit agencies,
Department of Public Instruction
representatives, researchers, school
board members, legal experts, and
college students. Attendees were
highly invested in the topic and
engaged in a spirited discussion
about how they might address
the challenging issue of school
suspension. As with all N.C. Family
Impact Seminars, this one was in
response to policymaker interest and
sought to highlight what the research
says about a current issue, as well as
giving recommendations for possible
policy action.
Presenters provided participants
with research and policy evidence
on school suspension and offered
recommendations for possible
policy and practice enhancements.
Presentations covered:
• The importance of examining
school suspension
• The legal issues that frame
suspension policy
• The data on suspension policy
from 14 southern states
• The research evidence on
the effects of suspension and
alternatives to suspension
• North Carolina data on the nature
of suspension and its effects
• Possible policy approaches
for addressing the suspension
problem.
Before reviewing the seminar
highlights, it is useful to briefly review
the nature of suspension in North
Carolina. There are multiple types of
suspension, including short-term (up to
10 days), long-term (over 10 days), and
365-day suspension. Misbehaviors that
could lead to short-term suspension are
highly variable across districts, including
(but not limited to) repeated violations
of cell phone use, chronically disruptive
behaviors, gambling, distribution of
prescription or non-prescription drugs,
fighting, bullying, horseplay, and altering
report cards (i.e., falsifying information).
More serious and repeated misbehaviors
lead to long-term suspensions and
include such behaviors as physical
assault causing serious injury, theft,
breaking and entering, sexual activity,
alcohol or drug use, refusal to allow
a search of possessions, and gang
activity. Misbehaviors that lead to 365-day
suspension may include possession of a
firearm, physical assault causing serious
injury to a student or school personnel,
use of a controlled substance, and
communicating a bomb or terrorist threat.
Districts must have an appeals
policy and must have an alternative
education setting that may be used
for suspended students. Districts
decide whether a suspended student
will receive the alternative education
option. Some alternative education
programs include activities to
alleviate the misbehaviors that lead
to the suspension, in addition to
academically-focused activities. The
state has no figures on the percentage
of suspended students who receive
alternative placements.
Seminar Highlights
The seminar started with Jenni
Owen, director of policy initiatives
at the Center for Child and Family
Policy (CCFP), noting the importance
of examining school suspension
from both research and policy
perspectives. Owen highlighted the
2010 N.C. Family Impact Seminar School Suspension in North Carolina: Research and Policy Options by Anne-Marie Iselin
To contextualize the suspension policy and practices of North
Carolina, Joel Rosch, senior research scholar and policy liaison at
CCFP, discussed policies and practices from 14 southern states.
POLICY
9www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
challenges that policymakers face,
especially the challenges of meeting
the needs of students, schools, and
communities while also infusing
disciplinary approaches with evidence-
based practices. She noted that these
challenges are especially complex,
given that resources are limited and
that reconciling statewide standards
with desires to allow local control over
practices is a formidable task. Owen
suggested that suspension policies
should have minimum standards while
also being flexible, allowing for a range
of evidence-based options to address
individual student needs. To do this,
she recommended building on existing
community partnerships as well as
forging new ones.
Ann McColl, a practicing attorney
focusing on school law and a faculty
member at the UNC School of
Government, summarized the legal
aspects of suspension that frame
policy and practice. She gave details
on several key issues including the
responsibilities of maintaining safe
school environments, of ensuring the
accountability of school personnel in
maintaining school safety, of providing
professional development to school
personnel, and of providing an array
of mechanisms to address the unique
behavioral needs of students.
To contextualize the suspension
policy and practices of North Carolina,
Joel Rosch, senior research scholar
and policy liaison at CCFP, discussed
policies and practices from 14 southern
states. He emphasized that state and
local policy is crucial to understanding
the nature of suspension. Rosch noted
that some states require that alternative
learning opportunities be provided to
students while they are suspended.
After discussing the state of
suspension in North Carolina, Anne-
Marie Iselin, research scientist at CCFP,
reviewed the research evidence on
school suspension and alternatives
to suspension. She reported that the
evidence suggests that suspension
has more negative than positive
effects on students and schools. Iselin
commented that research suggests
that alternatives to suspension should
be used as frequently as possible.
She highlighted that suspension
rates are related to factors that cut
across and interact with student,
teacher, administrative, institutional,
and community characteristics. Iselin
concluded by saying that research
supports school-wide practices that are
positive, collaborative, consistent, and
sensitive to individual student needs.
Clara Muschkin, assistant research
professor of public policy studies,
followed with a discussion of data
from the North Carolina Education
Research Data Center, which she
directs. She commented that there
has been an increase in the use of
short-term suspension and a decrease
in the use of long-term suspension
over time. The use of suspension,
however, varies drastically across
school districts. Muschkin highlighted
that the increased use of suspension
is strongly related to (1) decreased
student achievement, (2) decreased
student progression within grade
level, and (3) increased probability
of dropping out of school. She
suggested that policies aimed at
reducing suspension should evaluate
both cross-school and cross-district
characteristics, in addition to
evaluating student characteristics.
She concluded by noting that academic
support is often a necessary component
of successful policy for reducing
suspension use.
The seminar concluded with a
lively discussion among presenters
and participants who asked important
questions about a range of suspension
issues, such as tracking suspension
data across the state, and whether there
are models of promising alternatives
to suspension that could be replicated
district- or state-wide. The briefing
materials that accompanied the
seminar and address some of the
issues raised are available at http://
www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu/
engagement/ncfis_2010.php t
___________________________________
Special thanks to all who helped with or participated in the event: Kara Bonneau, D.J. Cratty, Anne Fletcher, Muping Gan, Jonah Garson, Tamie Harbison, Anne-Marie Iselin, Erika Layko, Ann McColl, Clara Muschkin, Jenni Owen, Joel Rosch and Shannon Smith. Anne-Marie Iselin is a clinical psychologist and research scientist in the Center for Child and Family Policy.
The seminar concluded with a lively discussion among presenters
and participants who asked important questions about a range
of suspension issues, such as tracking suspension data across
the state, and whether there are models of promising alternatives
to suspension that could be replicated district- or state-wide.
10 Fall 2010
“School’s out for the summer”
was the happy refrain for most
K-12 students across North Carolina last
June. But for students suspended for
disciplinary infractions, school ended
days, weeks, even months earlier.Research shows that suspended
students are more likely to drop out of school, to exhibit behavioral problems and to be involved with crime. Social deviance, isolation, poor academic achievement and unemployment are also more likely, making this everyone’s problem —taxpayers, employers and the public at large.
Recent data show North Carolina with the third-highest rate and fourth-highest number of suspensions in the nation. In 2008-09, more than 150,000 students in our state received short-term (up to 10 days) suspensions. Nearly 2,500 received suspensions of over 10 days. That’s a minimum of two weeks of school. In many cases, the same student received multiple suspensions.
With a new school year about to begin, the suspension problem deserves attention. Consider these two hypothetical but realistic scenarios: Scenario 1: Three students are each suspended for 25 days. As part of the suspension, one is required to spend two hours per day at a tutoring center. The second student must attend a full-time alternative school. And the third student is not required to do any educational activity while suspended.
This scenario highlights two challenges with the current suspension landscape. First, while school districts in North Carolina must have alternatives for suspended students, they are not required to offer those alternatives to every suspended student. Second, following current reporting practices, while all three students would be logged as long-term suspended students, the dramatic differences among their suspension requirements would not be reported.
Scenario 2: Two classrooms each have 10 girls. In classroom A, five girls were suspended one time during the school year. In classroom B, one girl was suspended five times. The problem this scenario illustrates is that in both cases, the suspension rate for girls is reported as 50 percent, even though one classroom had five out of 10 girls suspended, and the other had only one.
Policymakers and education leaders are grappling with what to do about the “suspension problem.” But how can they develop sound policy when scenarios like these lose their differences when officially reported? Strategies might focus on an entire class when the problem involves only a few students. Conversely, one might assume from reports that a few students are responsible for most of the bad behavior, when in fact it involves many students.
Policies and strategies for addressing high rates of suspension can be misguided because of misinterpreted data.
What should education and policy leaders do?
At the state policy level, revised reporting guidelines could include details of infractions and their consequences to differentiate among them more specifically, thereby painting a more realistic picture of the suspension problem from which policy can be developed.
At the school level, innovative alternatives to suspension are possible.
In Durham, Southwest Elementary is using a new strategy that had a huge impact in its first year. As an alternative to suspension, students continue to attend class but serve after-school detention for as many days as they would have been suspended. If parents decline this alternative, the student is suspended.
Parents have opted for suspension over detention only twice. Southwest has seen a 75 percent drop in suspensions and roughly a 50 percent decrease in the
number of students committing offenses that would merit suspension. As principal Ari Cohen says, “The best thing for children is to stay in school, not to be at home missing days of instruction. The detention alternative is not only keeping students in school, but we think it is also preventing many behavioral infractions from occurring in the first place.”
Ideally, schools, families and communities work together to prevent suspension through strong partnerships, effective positive behavior support programs and services for students and families. We endorse consequences that are appropriate and reformative for problem behaviors, but we believe alternatives exist that could decrease suspensions and the negative outcomes associated with them.
Cohen’s approach is one alternative. Another is a sanction where students perform a needed service to the school or the community at-large. Business and nonprofit leaders —students’ future employers —could be enlisted to offer other settings for productive and educational “punishments.”
A district may not have enough alternative education opportunities for every suspended student. But with a new school year about to begin, one thing is clear: suspension to idleness —forced truancy —should not be an option. With innovative alternatives to suspension, more students will truly be able to say, “School’s out for the summer.” t
___________________________________
Heidi Carter is vice chair of the Durham Public Schools Board of Education; Jenni Owen is the director of policy initiatives at Duke’s Center for Child and Family Policy. Both are parents of students in the Durham Public Schools.
This op-ed originally appeared in the August 19, 2010, issue of the News and Observer and the September 4, 2010, issue of the Durham Herald-Sun.
Getting a Handle on Suspension by Jenni Owen and Heidi Carter
POLICY
11www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
Last spring, Elizabeth Ananat, assistant professor of public policy and economics
and faculty fellow of the Center for Child and Family Policy, was in the middle of her yearlong sabbatical at the Brookings Institution when an unexpected call came. She was asked to serve as a senior economist for the White House Council of Economic Advisers for three months.
The council’s three members are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate, and they are supported by six senior economists and a group of junior staffers. The senior economists usually serve for a year; however, the early departure of an economist left a three-month gap that needed to be filled. A common expression among White House employees, Ananat reports, is that each agency is running “a relay race where we’re always looking for fresh legs.”
Beginning on April 15, 2010, Ananat stepped into the relay carrying the portfolio for labor, education and welfare. By her third day, she was preparing a briefing for the president. “It was a steep learning curve,” Ananat said.
Among her responsibilities was working with the chair of the council, Christy Romer, and others to prepare the monthly employment memo, which reports the growth in the number of jobs in the U.S. since the previous month. The day before release of the memo all communication about it had to be done on secure lines, so that no information would leak and affect the stock market. A hard copy would be delivered to the president in the evening, prior to the release of the data to the media the next morning.
Ananat also helped prepare other memos to the president, including the DEB, or daily economic briefing, a one-page of bullet points designed to “give the president everything he needs to know about the day’s economic news, without anything extra.” The high point of her service was seeing a briefing she had drafted circulate with President Obama’s handwritten note in the margin, stating, “We need to get this up to the Hill.” The data she had included helped support the creation of the teachers’ jobs bill that passed in August.
Ananat also vetted drafts of presidential speeches and publications on issues including immigration, domestic, civil and legal affairs that touched on labor and education. “One of my jobs was to be ‘the economist in the room’ for many of the discussions around those issues,” Ananat said.
Ananat also represented the White House in an interdepartmental working group tasked with developing a new set of questions for the Current Population Survey about “nontraditional education,” such as classes required by employers, certification programs, and training conducted by community colleges and for-profit colleges.
“We don’t know much about these programs, what’s out there and what is effective in helping people increase their employability and their wages,” she said. Collecting this data will allow researchers to
examine how such programs help with economic mobility. Council member Cecilia Rouse pushed to establish the group, which is led by the Department of Education’s Institute of Educational Sciences and involves IES Director John Easton. (Easton gave the Center’s Sulzberger Distinguished Lecture on September 22.)
The pace of the job was intense. When a question came to her, Ananat often had only a few hours to provide the answer. She rarely left the office before 7 p.m., and then would continue to work on her Blackberry during her Metro commute and after she arrived home. In spite of the demanding schedule, Ananat found the job rewarding.
“It was a very satisfying feeling that you are changing the conversation, that the things you know matter,” she said. “This is the most evidence-based administration ever seen in D.C. People care about having the best possible information. It’s a great environment for policy researchers.”
The experience will inform her teaching this fall. She can now say to her students, “Here’s why you need this tool.” For instance, when she needed to discover how many jobs proposed funding would save, the programming language Stata, which is taught in Sanford’s statistics courses, helped her analyze the data. Data memo writing and documentation skills are crucial, “so you can explain your conclusions clearly to an audience that doesn’t have economic training.” It also provides fresh motivation for her own research, she said. Now she knows that “for every topic I study there are people waiting to hear the answer.” t
_________________________________________________________
Jackie Ogburn is a communications specialist in the Sanford School of Public Policy.
Ananat Serves Stint on White House Council of Economic Advisers by Jackie Ogburn
Ananat
POLICY
12 Fall 2010
Three years ago, Jenni Owen found
herself in Wentworth, South Africa, a
small community outside of Durban, on
a day visit as part of a larger trip through
South Africa as an Eisenhower Fellow.
The community of Wentworth and the
nongovernmental organizations (NGOs)
and families Owen met during her visit
remained in her thoughts after returning
to Duke and her position as director of
policy initiatives and associate director
for policy and translation at the Center
for Child and Family Policy. Through funding from DukeEngage,
Owen has developed a program for Duke students in Wentworth that ties some aspects of the Center’s work to on-the-ground service and learning. This past summer marks Owen’s first year as director of the DukeEngage program in Wentworth, South Africa. Under Owen’s lead, nine Duke students spent eight weeks living with families, serving with local organizations, and immersing themselves in the community.
For many reasons, the community of Wentworth faces unique challenges, which were evident to Owen during her first visit. Pollution associated with local industry has had a significant impact on residents’ health. As an economically diverse community, there are areas where residents live comfortably but also areas of extreme poverty. Wentworth is also distinct as it was initially populated almost exclusively by “coloured” South Africans. Owen identified multiple community partners that welcomed additional support to address the many pressing and diverse issues facing the area.
DukeEngage seemed the perfect vehicle for putting that support into place. The program empowers students to address critical human needs through immersive service, in the process transforming students,
advancing the University’s educational mission, and providing meaningful assistance to communities in the U.S. and abroad.
The Wentworth program focuses on child and family issues, and Owen hopes to connect the program more directly with the Center’s work in the future. During this first year, students worked with a variety of community partners on issues such as domestic violence, education and youth leadership. Although students were in Wentworth for only a short time, they contributed meaningfully to the community. The students’ many projects included:
• Succeeding with the request for one organization’s first computer donation from a local corporation
• Assisting with direct service activities in children’s homes and local schools
• Writing grant proposals
• Aiding the development of a new awards program to highlight the good work of local nongovernmental organizations and businesses.
In addition, students participated in group service projects, including preparing and transforming a trash-strewn plot of land into a productive garden for community members who were seeking assistance through a domestic violence initiative.
Participating in a DukeEngage program is more than just an opportunity for students to engage and serve communities. Over the course of the program, Owen observed that students became better at viewing challenges that arose as part of the cultural learning experience rather than seeing these differences as inconveniences. In addition to learning about and contributing to the Wentworth community,
multiple students expressed that the DukeEngage experience had a significant impact on their lives, whether influencing their cultural perceptions and understanding, their future coursework and involvement at Duke or their long-term professional plans.
Owen intends to run the program again next year. She remarked, “I’m hopeful that we will continue to grow the relationships with the Wentworth community leaders and local NGOs and that this will yield possibilities for additional engagement and collaborative research with the Center and possibly elsewhere at Duke.” Owen acknowledges that without the generosity of the Wentworth community, the DukeEngage program there would not have been possible. To learn more about DukeEngage or this program, please visit http://dukeengage.duke.edu/immersion-programs/international-programs/south-africa-durban. t
___________________________________
Emily Durham is a program coordinator in the DukeEngage office.
Engaging Directly with Children and Families: DukeEngage in Durban, South Africa by Emily Durham
SERVICE
The members of the University-based Child and Family Policy Consortium consist of centers and programs housed
in universities across the country that represent the social, behavioral and health sciences fields, including anthropology, economics, human development, nursing, pediatrics, political science, psychology, public health and sociology. The consortium, which began in 2002, fosters scientific collaboration around child and family policy issues, cross-disciplinary undergraduate and graduate training, and effective translation between research, practice and policy issues.
Although Jenni Owen, the Center’s director of policy initiatives, has been the part-time director of the consortium since 2008, Deborah Phillips of the psychology department and Public Policy Institute at Georgetown has, until recently, managed the administration of consortium membership and finances. On July 1, the administrative and financial management of the consortium moved to Duke’s Center for Child and Family Policy.
“The Consortium brings together over 30 leading university centers for child and family policy. It is an honor, a responsibility and a reflection of the strong leadership provided by Jenni Owen to have it based at Duke,” commented Ken Dodge, director of the Center. Center staff working with Owen in managing activities includes Barbara Pollock who oversees finances, Shannon Smith who handles administrative duties such as correspondence and scheduling, and Joy Stutts, who assists with the Web site - http://www.childpolicyuniversityconsortium.com/.
Says Consortium steering committee member Phillips, “As one of the founders, with Professor Dodge, of the Consortium, I’ve been thrilled to see the growth in its capacity to have a substantive and lasting impact, not only on the field of child development and social policy but also for the state and federal policymakers who make decisions every day that affect the well-being of our nation’s children and families.” t
Administration of the University-Based Child and Family Policy Consortium Moved to Duke
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Research Scientist Ben Goodman is working with Center Director Ken Dodge on the Durham Family Initiative (funded by The Duke Endowment), as well as the NIDA-funded project entitled “The Development and Prevention of Substance Use Problems.” His primary responsibilities involve leading research examining the implementation of the Durham Connects program, as well as subsequent evaluations of its impact on Durham families. Prior to joining the Center for Child and Family Policy, Goodman was a postdoctoral scholar at Penn State’s Prevention Research Center, working with Dr. Mark Greenberg on a longitudinal study of child development among families living in predominantly low-income, rural communities. Goodman completed his Ph.D. in human development and family studies at Penn State in December 2009. His research focuses broadly on the influence of stress and support on the quality of parent-child relationships and parents’ own well-being, including the factors that contribute to fathers’ relationships with their infants and young children; the study of family processes among low-income and underrepresented populations; and the use of person-oriented methodologies to examine patterns of family dynamics and parent-child relationships. t Amy Schulting is a newly hired research scientist working with Ken Dodge and Phil Cook on the TPRC-funded pilot project entitled “Truancy: Social costs, causes, and prevention.” The truancy pilot project has been utilizing Fast Track data to better understand both the patterns and correlates of school truancy over time, with a particular emphasis on understanding early elementary truancy. In addition to earning her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Duke in May 2010, Schulting also earned the child development certificate. Her dissertation was entitled “The Kindergarten Home Visit Project: A Kindergarten Transition Intervention Study.” She will be working from her home office in Minnesota. t
New Researchers Join Center on July 1, 2010
FACULTY AND RESEARCHER NEWS
Goodman
Schulting
13www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
14 Fall 2010
Two Duke faculty members have joined the TPRC executive committee: CCFP Faculty Fellow Phil Cook, who is senior associate dean for faculty and research, ITT/Sanford Professor of Public Policy, professor of economics and sociology; and Kathy Sikkema, professor of psychology and neuroscience, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and director of the Duke Center for AIDS Research, Social and Behavioral Sciences Core. Cook and Sikkema join current executive committee members Phil Costanzo, Jane Costello, Ken Dodge, Rick Hoyle and Tim Strauman. Committee members Linda Burton and Terrie Moffitt are on sabbatical this year. t
New Transdisciplinary Prevention Research Center (TPRC) Executive Committee Members Named
FACULTY AND RESEARCHER NEWS
Congratulations to Center Faculty
Fellow Elizabeth Ananat who was
recently named a William T. Grant
Scholar. Ananat is an assistant
professor of public policy and
economics. The William T. Grant
Scholars Program supports promising
early-career researchers from diverse
disciplines who have demonstrated
success in conducting high-quality
research and are seeking to further
develop and broaden their expertise.
Four to six scholars are named each
year. Ananat received $350,000 for her
five-year project entitled, “Economic and
Social Determinents of the Educational,
Occupational, and Residential Choices
of Young Adults.” t
The Parenting Across Cultures project
(PI Jennifer Lansford, Investigator
Ken Dodge, Research Coordinator
Ann Skinner) recently received funding
from the Jacobs Foundation via a
research prize awarded to Laurence
Steinberg, Ph.D. of Temple University.
These new funds will be used to conduct
an assessment of judgment, decision-
making and psychosocial development
in China, Colombia, India, Italy, Jordan,
Kenya, the Philippines, Sweden, Thailand
and the United States. The assessment
includes questions about several
aspects of development that affect the
choices young people make, including
choices to engage in risky and antisocial
behavior. These aspects of development
include impulsivity, foresight, sensation-
seeking, planning and reward salience.
The results will have important policy
implications with respect to issues such
as making judgments about the criminal
responsibility of juvenile offenders
and understanding the age at which
individuals develop the capacities to be
held fully responsible for their actions. t
Funding Awards
Lansford Dodge Skinner
Cook Sikkema
15www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
FACULTY AND RESEARCHER NEWS
Avshalom Caspi and Terrie Moffitt,
Center faculty fellows and professors of
psychology and neuroscience at Duke,
received $488,916 for a project funded
by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National
Institute of Child Health and Human
Development (NICHD). The major goal
of the four-year project entitled “Social
Inequality and Children’s Mental Health
(The E-risk Longitudinal Twin Study)”
is to explore how social inequalities
influence children’s development. The
research is being conducted on three
levels of analysis: neighborhood, family
and individual. t
Investigators Desiree Murray, CCFP
faculty fellow and assistant professor
of psychiatry and behavioral sciences,
and CCFP Associate Director and
Research Professor of Psychology and
Neuroscience David Rabiner received
$933,878 (direct costs) from the Institute
of Educational Sciences/Department of
Education for a project entitled “Effects
of Classroom Management Training on
Early Learning Skills.” This four-year
project, which began in July 2009, is
a randomized, controlled evaluation of
the Incredible Years Teacher Training
Program on K-2 students’ reading and
math skills and social and emotional
competence. t
Desiree Murray also is implementing
the Incredible Years Teacher Training
Program in one of the inner-city Durham
schools. Funding for her consultant
work comes from Communities
in Schools. t
Clinical psychology graduate student
Shelley Alonso-Marsden, who is
mentored by Center Director Ken
Dodge, recently received four years of
funding for a diversity supplement on
Dodge’s award entitled “Development
and Prevention of Substance Abuse
Problems.” Alonso-Marsden will conduct
studies of the processes through
which early social experiences lead
to healthy or maladaptive outcomes
for children, using the data sets from
the Child Development Project and the
Fast Track Project. The funding also will
support her training in developmental
psychopathology toward the goal of
leading an academic research career. t
Murray Rabiner
Funding AwardsContinued
Psychology graduate student Sandra Nay McCourt has been selected for a one-year appointment as a predoctoral fellow of the Carolina Consortium on Human Development (CCHD). Sandra is mentored by Center Director Ken Dodge and is studying developmental processes that underlie maladjustment or resilience in response to early traumatic experiences. The predoctoral fellowship program is unique in that it provides formal support (i.e., NICHD- sponsored
fellowships) for one year in the final years of doctoral training. This is an optimal point for involvement in the program because, after several years of study, graduate students are well prepared for the undertaking, and they have time for the intense participation of CCHD’s demanding program. t
Grad Student Selected for Fellowship at Carolina Consortium on Human Development
Nay McCourt
15www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
Caspi Moffitt
Bowes, L., Maughan, B., Caspi, A., Moffitt, T.E., & Arseneault, L. (2010). Families promote emotional and behavioural resilience to bullying: Evidence of an environmental effect. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 51, 809-817.
Caspi, A., Holmes, A., Uher, R., Hariri, A., & Moffitt, T.E., (2010). Genetic sensitivity to the environment: The case of the serotonin transporter gene (5-HTT), and its implications for studying complex diseases and traits. American Journal of Psychiatry, 167, 509-527.
Danese, A., Caspi, A., Williams, B., Ambler, A., Sugden, K., Mika J., Werts, H., Freeman, J., Pariante, C., Moffitt, T.E., & Arseneault, L. (2010). Biological embedding of stress through inflammation processes in childhood. Molecular Psychiatry advance online publication, 16 February 2010; doi: 10.1038/mp.2010.5. PMID: 20157309.
Houts, R.M., Caspi, A., Pianta, R.C., Arseneault, L., & Moffitt, T.E. (in press). The challenging pupil in the classroom: Child effects on teachers. Psychological Science.
Polanczyk, G., Caspi, A., Houts, R., Kollins, S., Rhode, L.A., Moffitt, T.E. (2010). Extending the ADHD age of onset criterion to 12 years of age: Impact on prevalence and correlates evaluated in a prospectively studied birth cohort. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 49(3), 210-216.
Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group (Ken Dodge, member). (2010). The Effects of a Multi-Year Universal Social-Emotional Learning Program: The Role of Student and School Characteristics. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 78(2), 156-168.
Dodge, K.A., & McCourt, S.N. (2010). Translating models of antisocial behavioral development into efficacious intervention policy to prevent adolescent violence. Developmental Psychobiology, 52(3), 277-285.
Edwards, A.C., Dodge, K.A., Latendresse, S.J., Lansford, J.E., Bates, J.E., Pettit, G.S., Budde, J.P., Goate, A.M., & Dick, D.M. (2010). MAOA-uVNTR and Early Physical Discipline Interact to Influence Delinquent Behavior. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 51(6), 679-687.
Gibson-Davis, C.M. & Gassman-Pines, A. (2010). Early childhood family structure and mother-child interactions: Variation by race and ethnicity. Developmental Psychology, 46, 151-164.
Lansford, J.E., Dishion, T.J., & Dodge, K.A. (2010). Deviant peer clustering and influence within public school settings: Inadvertent negative outcomes from traditional professional practices. In M.R. Shinn, H.M. Walker, & G. Stoner (Eds.), Interventions for achievement and behavior in a three-tier model including response to intervention. Bethesda, MD: National Association for School Psychologists Press.
Lansford, J.E., Dodge, K.A., Pettit, G.S., & Bates, J.E. (2010). Does physical abuse in early childhood predict substance use in adolescence and early adulthood? Child Maltreatment, 15, 190-194.
Yu, T., Pettit, G.S., Lansford, J.E., Dodge, K.A., & Bates, J.E. (2010). The interactive effects of marital conflict and divorce on parent-adult children’s relationships. Journal of Marriage and Family, 72, 282-292.
Lansford, J.E., Malone, P.S., Dodge, K.A., Pettit, G.S., & Bates, J.E. (2010). Developmental cascades of peer rejection, social information processing biases, and aggression during middle school. Development and Psychopathology, 22, 593-602.
Lansford, J.E., Malone, P.S., Dodge, K.A., Chang, L., Chaudhary, N., Tapanya, S., Oburu, P., & Deater-Deckard, K. (2010). Children’s perceptions of maternal hostility as a mediator of the link between discipline and children’s adjustment in four countries. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 34, 452–461.
Recent Publications
PUBLICATIONS
16 Fall 2010
Belsky, D., Moffitt, T.E., Arseneault, L., Melchior, M., Caspi, A. (in press). Context and consequences of food insecurity in children’s development. American Journal of Epidemiology.
Moffitt, T.E., Caspi, A., Taylor, A., Kokaua, J., Milne, B.J., Polanczyk, G., & Poulton, R. (2010). How common are common mental disorders? Evidence that lifetime rates are doubled by prospective versus retrospective ascertainment. Psychological Medicine, 40, 899-910.
Polanczyk, G., Moffitt, T.E., Arseneault, L., Cannon, M., Ambler, A., Keefe, R.S.E., Houts, R., Odgers, C.L., & Caspi, A. (2010). Childhood psychotic symptoms share etiological and clinical features with adult schizophrenia: Results from a representative birth cohort. Archives of General Psychiatry, 67, 328-338.
Poulton, R., & Moffitt, T.E. (2010). The Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Study: tips and traps from a 40-year longitudinal study. International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development Newsletter, 57(1).
Reichenberg, A., Caspi, A., Harrington, H.L., Houts, R., Keefe, R.S.E., Murray, R.M., Poulton, R., & Moffitt, T.E. (2010). Static and dynamic cognitive deficits in childhood precede adult schizophrenia: A 30-year study. American Journal of Psychiatry, 167, 160-169.
Rutter, M., Griffiths, S., Belsky, J., Brown, G., Dunn, J., D’Onofrio, B., Eekelaar, J., Ermisch, J., Moffitt, T.E., Gardner, F., Weale, A., & Witherspoon, S. (2010). Social Science and Family Policies. London: The British Academy Press.
Sugden, K., Arseneault, L., Harrington, H.L., Moffitt, T.E., Williams, B.S., Caspi, A. (2010). The serotonin transporter gene moderates the development of emotional problems among children following bullying victimization. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, DOI: 10.1016/j.jaac.2010.01.024.
Wong, C.C.Y., Caspi, A., Willliams, B., Craig, I., Houts, R., Ambler, A., Moffitt, T.E., & Mill, J. (2010). A longitudinal study of epigenetic variation in twins. Epigenetics, 5(6), 1-11.
Murray, D.W., Rabiner, D.L., Hardy, K. (accepted with revisions). Teacher Management Questionnaire (TMQ): Development of a self-report measure for at-risk elementary students. Journal of Attention Disorders.
Murray, D.W., Jensen, P.S., Hinshaw, S.P., Wells, K., Wigal, T., & Weisner, T. for the MTA Group (Nov., 2010). Mining the Meanings of ADHD, Treatment, and Substance Use/Abuse: The MTA Turning Points Study. Symposium accepted to the annual meeting of AACAP, New York, NY.
Gallagher, R., Abikoff, H., Wells, K., Murray, D.W. (Nov., 2010). Pushing the Envelope in ADHD Treatment: Testing Promising Psychosocial Interventions for Organizational Skills and Social Behavior. Symposium accepted to the annual meeting of the Association of Behavior and Cognitive Therapy, San Francisco, CA.
Rabiner, D.L., Murray, D.W., Rosen, L., Hardy, K., Skinner, A., Underwood, M. (2010). Instability in teacher ratings of children’s inattentive symptoms: Implications for the assessment of ADHD. Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, 31(3).
Rabiner, D.L., Murray, D.W., Skinner, A.T., & Malone, P. (2010). A randomized trial of two promising computer-based interventions for students with attention difficulties. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 38(1), 131-42.
Fontaine, R.G., Tanha, M., Yang, C., Dodge, K.A., Bates, J.E., & Pettit, G.S. (2010). Does response evaluation and decision (RED) mediate the relation between hostile attributional style and antisocial behavior in adolescence? Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 38, 615–626.
17www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
Anna Gassman-Pines, professor of public policy and Center faculty fellow, made a presentation at UNC-Greensboro, Department of Human Development and Family Studies, on March 26. The presentation was entitled, “Daily associations between low-income mothers’ nonstandard work schedules and family outcomes.” The study investigated low-income mothers’ daily, nighttime and weekend work and family outcomes. Sixty-one mothers of preschool-aged children reported daily on work hours, mood, mother-child interaction and child behavior for two weeks (N = 724 person-days). Although nighttime and weekend work are both nonstandard schedules, results showed adverse associations of working nighttime hours on family outcomes – more negative mood and mother-child interactions; less positive child behavior – but no relationship between weekend work and family outcomes. The study is currently in press in Family Relations.
In April, CCFP Faculty Fellow Jennifer Lansford delivered a keynote address, “Managing Behavior Problems in Today’s Schools,” at a conference called “Education in a Changing World” in Zarqa, Jordan. Lansford’s address focused on risks associated with aggregating high-risk youth in education settings and promising alternatives that do not aggregate high-risk youth. The conference brought together scholars, practitioners and policymakers from throughout the Middle East to discuss evidence-based best practices in education. In July 2003, Jordan became a leader in education reform in the Middle East when the Ministry of Education launched a major initiative called Education Reform for the Knowledge Economy to achieve sustainable learning outcomes relevant to a knowledge economy. Four major components are part of this broad reform: (1) Reorienting education policy objectives and strategies and reforming governance and administrative systems; (2) Transforming education programs and practices to achieve learning outcomes relevant to a knowledge economy; (3) Supporting the provision of quality physical learning environments; and (4) Promoting school readiness through expanded early childhood education.
CCFP Faculty Fellow and Assistant Research Professor of Public Policy Studies Clara Muschkin attended the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, held in Denver, Colorado, April 30-May 4. She presented a paper (co-authored with Audrey Beck) entitled “Changing Contours of the North Carolina Public Schools: The
Influence of Immigration on Enrollments of Non-Hispanic White Students” in the paper session entitled “Immigration, Migration and Language Policies: Issues in the Education of Latino Students.” The paper focused on the fact that researchers, policymakers and parents share a perception that school composition is a major influence on school quality. An important source of change in school populations is the withdrawal of white and more affluent families in reaction to perceived reallocation of resources toward limited English speakers and a general devaluation of social capital in schools. This study focused on North Carolina, which experienced an increase of over 66 percent in the school-age population of Latino origin between 2000 and 2006, as well as large increases in the proportion of students from poor families, many of whom are Latino. Longitudinal administrative data are used to estimate the impact of immigration on racial, ethnic and socioeconomic composition within and across schools.
The Duke University School Research Partnership Office held an end-of-semester dinner on May 4 during which poster presentations were made by Duke undergraduates on their consultation work during the 2009-10 academic year with Durham Public Schools (DPS) administrators, principals and board members. Other highlights of the evening included a presentation by William (Sandy) Darity on racialized tracking in schools; a discussion of current research priorities by Heidi Coleman and Jeanette Avery of DPS, including areas of potential collaboration with Duke researchers; and remarks by Durham Board of Education member Heidi Carter regarding future DPS-Duke partnership possibilities.
On May 6, Research Scientist Lisa Berlin was an invited discussant at the Frank Porter Graham Institute’s meeting to launch its infant/toddler child care initiative, where she spoke on “Regulating the Hothouse or Applying What We Know about Child Characteristics to the Development of a Model for Center-Based Infant/Toddler Care.” Berlin’s remarks followed those of Jack Bates (University of Indiana), who stressed the importance of child care providers using information about infant temperament to tailor their caregiving behaviors. In addition to agreeing with Bates’ points, Berlin emphasized the importance of understanding caregivers’ characteristics, which may influence their flexibility and receptivity to different infant qualities. Some caregivers, that is, may be more able than
Recent Presentations
PRESENTATIONS
18 Fall 2010
others to tailor their caregiving behaviors to various infant temperaments. Berlin also discussed her own, related, work on maternal characteristics affecting their responsiveness to Early Head Start services. Berlin found that mothers’ initial attachment styles (orientations about forming close relationships) influenced the effects of the Early Head Start program on their parenting behaviors, such that there were more positive program effects for mothers who began the program with less initial attachment avoidance or attachment anxiety. This research is forthcoming in a special issue of the journal, Attachment and Human Development, on “Attachment Processes in Early Head Start Families,” guest-edited by Berlin.
Center Faculty Fellow Jennifer Lansford made a presentation entitled “The Role of Personality in Pathways of Peer Relationships from Childhood to Young Adulthood” at the biennial meeting of the International Society for the Study of Behavioral Development (ISSBD), held in July 2010 in Lusaka, Zambia. This presentation was authored by Lansford, Ken Dodge, Tianyi Yu, Greg Pettit, and Jack Bates and addressed the question of how personality characteristics interact with cultural factors in leading to behavioral development. Lansford also presented an invited paper entitled “Parents’ discipline strategies and cognition about discipline in nine countries” that used data from the Parenting Across Cultures project to describe links among parents’ use of different discipline techniques, parents’ and children’s beliefs related to discipline, and children’s adjustment. The meeting was attended by child development researchers from across the world. Other Duke attendees included Center Faculty Fellows Avshalom Caspi and Terrie Moffitt.
Arsiwalla, D. D., Pettit, G. S., Lansford, J. E., Bates, J. E., & Dodge, K. A. (2010, March). The interplay of positive parenting and positive social information processing in the prediction of adolescent social adjustment. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research on Adolescence, Philadelphia, Pa.
Criss, M. M., Pettit, G. S., Shaw, D., Lansford, J. E., & Laird, R. D. (2010, March). Reciprocal associations between negative parenting and child antisocial behavior. Paper presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research on Adolescence, Philadelphia, Pa.
Erath, S. A., Pettit, G. S., Lansford, J. E., Dodge, K. A., & Bates, J. E. (2010, March). Childhood mutual disliking predicts adolescent aggression and relationship conflict. Paper presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research on Adolescence, Philadelphia, Pa.
Lansford, J. E., Deater-Deckard, K., & Malone, P. S. (2010, March). Relations between parental warmth and control in nine cultural groups. Paper presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research on Adolescence, Philadelphia, Pa.
Di Giunta, L., Miranda, M., Uribe Tirado, L., Bacchini, D., Bombi, A. S., Pastorelli, C., & Lansford, J. E. (2010, July). The association between parenting practices and parental warmth in a sample of Italian families. Paper presented at the International Congress on Interpersonal Acceptance and Rejection, Padua, Italy.
Miranda, M., Di Giunta, L., Bacchini, D., & Lansford, J. E. (2010, July). Relations of maternal acceptance-rejection and psychological adjustment in childhood. Poster presented at the International Congress on Interpersonal Acceptance and Rejection, Padua, Italy.
Murray, D.W., Rabiner, D., Malone, P., Skinner, A. (2010, May). Evaluation of a computerized attention training intervention in schools. Symposium presentation at the annual meeting of the Association for Psychological Science (APS), Boston, Mass.
Murray, D.W., Rabiner, D., Malone, P., Skinner, A. (2010, June). Computerized attention training for young children: Results of a randomized controlled trial and considerations for future research. Symposium presentation at the Fifth Annual Institute for Educational Sciences National Research Conference, National Harbor, Md.
Skinner, A. T., & Lansford, J. E. (2010, March). Parenting correlates of relational, physical, and nonphysical aggression in an international sample. Poster presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research on Adolescence, Philadelphia, Pa.
19www.childandfamilypolicy.duke.edu
Mission Bridging the gap between research and public policy to improve the lives of children and families.
Vision The Center for Child and Family Policy is working to solve problems facing children in contemporary society by bringing together scholars from various disciplines with policy makers and practitioners, in an effort to improve the lives of children and families. We are dedicated to teaching, research and policy engagement and focused on the areas of early childhood education, education policy and adolescent problem behavior.
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