SAGE Improves Achievement, Second Study Finds

• Full report (external link to UWM School of Education)

A second major study of SAGE -- Wisconsin's ground-breaking class-size reduction program -- again shows that it significantly improves student achievement.

The Student Achievement Guarantee in Education program appears to be "the most successful effort to date in closing the achievement gap between black and white elementary school students," according to a report on the study the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

"This study again proves that the best solution we have to improving academic achievement is not some complicated state government program that funnels tens of millions of taxpayers' dollars into private schools," said WEAC President Terry Craney. "The best solution is much simpler and more logical than that -- simply reduce class sizes in our public schools so that the best teachers in the nation can give every student the attention they deserve. Give our public schools the resources they need, and they will accomplish amazing things."

The second annual study of the SAGE program was conducted by researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and released by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.

"Common sense tells us that the more individual attention students receive ... the more they will learn and the better behaved they will be," state Superintendent John Benson said.

The SAGE program provides money to schools with large numbers of children from low-income families. It is used to reduce class sizes to 15 students in kindergarten through 3rd grade. The program is in operation in 80 schools throughout the state this year, and the study examined student performance in the 30 schools involved in the program last year.

The study compared the achievement of SAGE students with that of a comparison group of students who remained in traditionally larger classes. It tested both groups at the beginning of the last school year (1997-98) and again near the end of the school year.

The study, which echoes results of last year's study, found that SAGE students consistently demonstrated improved achievement, compared with their non-SAGE counterparts. Some of the biggest gains were among African-American students, who typically lag behind white students on standardized tests.

Among the results:

• 1st-grade students in SAGE classrooms achieved significantly higher scores than their non-SAGE counterparts in all tested areas -- math, reading and language arts.
• Students who were in 1st-grade SAGE classrooms in 1996-97 maintained their achievement advantage in 2nd grade last year.
• African-American students in the SAGE program scored lower than their non-SAGE counterparts before becoming involved in the program but scored significantly better than their non-SAGE counterparts after one year in the program.
• The biggest gains were among African-American students, signifying the success of the program in closing the achievement gap between white and non-white students.

Posted January 24, 1999