The purpose of this study was to investigate whether student achievement and absences are influenced by the home and social factors such as parental education, family make-up, ethnicity, home ownership, retention, free lunch, sex, and grade.
The following hypotheses were tested:
1. There was no statistically significant relationship at .05 level between student achievement and each of: grouping, grade, sex, mother's education, father's education, family make-up, ethnicity, free lunch, rehousing, home ownership.
2. There was no statistically significant relationship at the .05 level between student absenteeism and each of: achievement grouping, grade, sex, mother's education, father's education, family make-up, ethnicity, free lunch, rehousing, home ownership.
The population consisted of four classes (2, 4th and 2 5th grades) and 40 students randomly drawn from these classes. Twenty males and twenty females were represented, ten whites and thirty minorities out of a population of 75% minorities and 25% white. The instrument used was a schedule constructed to obtain information from school files on each variable as defined.
The main results were observed in the correlation matrix where:
Achievement was significantly related to grouping, mother's education, father's education, family make-up, free lunch, rehoused, retention, home ownership, hence the null hypotheses for these variables were rejected. Sex and ethnicity were not significantly related to achievement and hence the hull hypotheses for these variables were accepted.
Absenteeism were significantly related to achievement, grouping, sex, mother's education, father's education, family make-up, ethnicity, free lunch, rehousing/retention, and home ownership. The null hypotheses were therefore, rejected for these variables. However, the null hypotheses were accepted for absenteeism and grade level, and ethnicity.
In a factor analysis of the data achievement and absenteeism were placed in Factor 1 with father's education and mother's education, grouping, free lunch, family make-up, home ownership, and rehousing indicating that all these variables belong to the same family. Hence a change in one result is a change in the others.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:auctr.edu/oai:digitalcommons.auctr.edu:dissertations-4580 |
| Date | 01 July 1987 |
| Creators | Reams, Shirley |
| Publisher | DigitalCommons@Robert W. Woodruff Library, Atlanta University Center |
| Source Sets | Atlanta University Center |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | ETD Collection for AUC Robert W. Woodruff Library |
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