Violent-crime rates negatively affect students’ test scores but do not show an effect on overall grades, according to a study from Brown University.
Research associate Julia Burdick-Will used crime data from Chicago to find that schools plagued by violence showed small, but nonetheless significant, decreases in math and reading scores. Grades showed no substantial changes, however. The author suggests that a violent climate diminishes learning, but also lowers expectations schoolwide, explaining the discrepancy between test results and grades.
The research appears in the October edition of Sociology of Education.
