SCHOOLS, ACADEMIC MOTIVATION AND STAGE-ENVIRONMENT FIT

From the time individuals first enter school until they complete their formal schooling,
children and adolescents spend more time in schools than in any other place outside
their homes. Exploring all of the possible ways in which educational institutions influence
motivation and development during adolescence is beyond the scope of a single
chapter. In this chapter I discuss the ways in which schools influence adolescents’ socialemotional
and behavioral development through organizational, social, and instructional
processes ranging from those based in the immediate, proximal relation between
students and the tasks they are asked to perform to the role that principals and the
school boards play in setting school-level and district-level policies, which in turn influence
the social organization of the entire school community. I discuss at length three
examples of the ways in which these multiple organizational levels interact synergistically
to influence adolescent development through their impact on the daily experiences
that adolescents in the United States encounter as they move through the American
school system. The first example focuses on the role of school transitions, the
second on the role of curricular tracking, and the third on extracurricular activities.
Few of these processes have been studied in countries other than the United States. I
assume similar processes are true in other countries, but this remains to be demonstrated
empirically.
A DEVELOPMENTAL VIEW OF THE IMPACT OF SCHOOLS
ON DEVELOPMENT
Understanding the impact of schools on adolescent development requires a conceptual
framework for thinking simultaneously about schools as contexts in which development
takes place and about the changing developmental needs of students as they move
through the school system. My colleagues and I have been working on such a framework
for the last 20 years. In the late 1980s Carol Midgley and I proposed our model of stageenvironment
fit to guide research on the impact of school transitions on adolescent development
(see Eccles & Midgley, 1989; Eccles et al., 1993). We argued that individuals
have changing emotional, cognitive, and social needs and personal goals as they mature.
Drawing on ideas related to person-environment fit and self-determination theory
(e.g., Deci & Ryan, 1985), we argued that schools need to change in developmentally
125
appropriate ways if they are to provide the kind of social context that will continue to
motivate students’ interest and engagement as the students mature. To the extent that
this does not happen, we predicted that students would disengage first psychologically
and then physically from school as they matured into and through adolescence. This
should be particularly true as the adolescents acquired more incentives and more power
to control their own behavior. I say more about both of these psychological perspectives
on the impact of classroom experiences later.
More recently, Robert Roeser and I (see Eccles & Roeser, 1999) proposed a framework
for thinking about school influences that dissected the school context into a series
of hierarchically ordered, interdependent levels of organization beginning at the most
basic level of the classroom and then moving up in complexity to the school as an organizational
system embedded in a larger cultural system. In adopting this heuristic, we
assumed that (a) schools are systems characterized by multiple levels of regulatory processes
(organizational, social, and instructional in nature); (b) these processes are interrelated
across levels of analysis; (c) such processes are usually dynamic in nature,
sometimes being worked out each day between the various social actors (e.g., teachers
and students); (d) these processes change as children move through different school levels
(elementary, middle, and high school); and (e) these processes regulate children’s and
adolescents’ cognitive, social-emotional, and behavioral development. In this chapter
I focus on the interface between these theoretical frameworks. I begin with a summary
of Eccles and Roeser’s multilevel description of school contexts.
AN ECOLOGICAL VIEW OF SCHOOLS AND THEIR IMPACT ON
DEVELOPMENT DURING ADOLESCENCE
From the location of the school within macroregulatory systems characterized by national,
state, and school district laws and educational policies to the miniregulatory systems
that involve the minute-to-minute interactions between teachers and individual
students, schools are a system of complex, multilevel, regulatory processes. Eccles and
Roeser (1999) described these different levels of the school environment in terms of
their hierarchical ordering—moving from the student in a classroom, to the school
building itself, then to the school district, and finally to the larger communities in which
school districts are located. Within each of these levels, we discussed those beliefs and
practices that affect students’ experiences on a daily basis. At the classroom level, we
focused attention on teacher beliefs and instructional practices, teacher-student relationships,
the nature and design of tasks and instruction, and the nature and structure
of classroom activities and groups. At the level of the school building, we focused attention
on organizational climate and such schoolwide practices as academic tracking,
school start time, and the provision of extracurricular activities. At the level of the
school district, we focused on the between-school grade configurations that create particular
school-transition experiences for students. Finally at the level of schools embedded
in larger social systems, we discussed such issues as school resources, as well as
the linkages of schools with parents and with the labor market.
Eccles and Roeser (1999) further assumed that in any given school setting these multilevel
processes are interwoven with one another. Relations between different levels of
126 Schools, Academic Motivation, and Stage-Environment Fit
organization in the school may be complementary or contradictory and may influence
students either directly or indirectly. For instance, a principal may decide that all of his
or her teachers should use a particular practice such as cooperative learning. However,
the impact of such a decision on the daily experiences of students depends on how well
this practice is actually implemented at the classroom level. If done well, students
should be seen working successfully in groups on complex, authentic problems. Such a
well-implemented school policy is likely to produce gains in self-esteem, interethnic relationships,
and achievement among students, especially those of low ability or status
(Slavin, 1990). In contrast, if done poorly, chaos can result, leading to far less positive
outcomes at the student level. How such a schoolwide instructional policy is implemented
depends on many factors including the morale within the school, the relationships
between the principal and the teachers, the teachers’ understanding and endorsement
of the new instructional practice, the way in which the policy change was
decided upon, the provision of adequate in-service training, the provision of adequate
supports for implementation of new strategies, and the students’ willingness to go
along with the new practice. Recent debates about the likely impact of national standards
testing provide another example of the complex ways in which a new policy—this
time a state- or national-level policy—can affect the daily experiences of teachers and
students in the classroom and in the school building.
Eccles and Roeser (1999) also assumed that the processes associated with the different
levels of school interacting dynamically with each other, rather than static resources
or characteristics of the curriculum, teachers, or school per se, influence adolescents’
development. In addition, adolescents’ own constructions of meaning and interpretations
of events within the school environment are critical mediators between school
characteristics and students’ feelings, beliefs, and behavior.
Finally, in keeping with the stage-environment perspective proposed by Eccles and
Midgely (1989), Eccles and Roeser (1999) assumed that these different school-related
processes change across the course of children’s and adolescents’ development as they
progress through elementary, middle, and high school. That is, not only are children
and adolescents developing, but so too is the whole nature of the schools that they attend.
For example, the organizational, social, and instructional processes in schools
change as children move from elementary to middle school. Eccles and Midgley argued
that these changes are often associated with declines in many adolescents’ motivation
and behavior. Understanding the interaction of different school features with the developmental
needs of adolescents is critical to understanding the role of schooling in
young people’s development (see Eccles & Midgley, 1989). In the next sections I discuss
those characteristics of each level likely to be most important for understanding the impact
of schools on adolescent development. I also discuss how school characteristics at
each level may also influence group differences in adolescent development, paying particular
attention to gender and ethnic group differences within the United States.
LEVEL 1: CLASSROOMS
The most immediate educational environment to the student is the classroom. This is
also the level that has received the most attention from educational psychologists. In
Level 1: Classrooms 127
this section I review what we know about teacher beliefs, classroom climate, the nature
of the academic work itself, and experiences of racial/ethnic discrimination.
Teacher Beliefs
Teacher beliefs have received much attention in educational psychology. In this section
I focus on two types of beliefs: Teachers’ general sense of their own teaching efficacy
and teachers’ expectations for specific students in their class.
Teachers’ General Sense of Efficacy
When teachers hold high general expectations for student achievement and students
perceive these expectations, students learn more, experience a greater sense of self-worth
and competence as learners, feel more connected to their teacher and their school, and
resist involvement in problem behaviors (Eccles et al. 1993; Lee & Smith, 2001; Roeser,
Eccles, & Sameroff, 1998; Rutter, 1983; Weinstein, 1989). Similarly, teachers who feel
they are able to reach even the most difficult students and who believe in their ability to
affect students’ lives communicate such positive expectations and beliefs to their students.
Thus, a high sense of general teacher efficacy can enhance students’ own confidence
in their ability to master academic material, thereby promoting effort investment
and achievement as well as a positive emotional relationship with their teacher and
greater engagement in school as a social institution (Ashton, 1985; Midgley, Feldlaufer,
& Eccles, 1989b). Alternatively, teachers who have low confidence in their teaching efficacy
often engage in behaviors that reinforce feelings of incompetence and alienation
in their students, increasing the likelihood that their students will develop learned helpless
responses to failure in the classroom, depressive affect, anger, and disengagement
(see Cole, 1991; Roeser, Eccles, & Freedman-Doan, 1999). Lee and Smith (2001) stressed
this aspect of teachers’ general beliefs as a critical component for secondary school reform
(see also Jackson & Davis, 2000).
As I discuss in more detail later, the prevalence of teachers with a low sense of personal
teaching efficacy is higher in junior high and middle schools than in elementary
schools and higher in schools that serve high proportions of ethnic minority and poor
adolescents than in schools that serve more affluent and higher achieving adolescents
(Darling-Hammond, 1997; Eccles, Wigfield, & Schiefele, 1998). This fact alone provides
a possible explanation for both average levels of declining school engagement
during early to middle adolescence and for social class and ethnic group differences in
school engagement.
Differential Teacher Expectations
Equally important are the differential expectations teachers often hold for various individuals
within the same classroom and the differential treatments that sometimes accompany
these expectations. Beginning with the work by Rosenthal (1969), many researchers
have shown that undermining teacher-expectancy effects depend on how
teachers structure activities differently, as well as interact differently with, high- and lowexpectancy
students and on how the students perceive these differences (Brophy, 1985;
Cooper, 1979; Eccles & Wigfield, 1985; Weinstein, 1989). Most concerns have been
128 Schools, Academic Motivation, and Stage-Environment Fit
raised over behaviors that create a self-fulfilling prophecy by undermining the learning
and well-being of those students for whom the teachers hold the lowest expectations.
Much work on teacher expectancy effects has focused on differential treatment related
to gender, race/ethnic group, and/or social class. Most of this work has documented
the small but fairly consistent undermining effects of low teacher expectations
on girls (for math and science), on minority children (for all subject areas), and on children
from lower-social-class family backgrounds (again for all subject areas) (see Eccles
& Wigfield, 1985; Ferguson, 1998; Jussim, Eccles, & Madon, 1996; Valencia, 1991).
In addition, Jussim et al. (1996) found that even though these effects are typically quite
small, young women, African American adolescents, and students from poorer homes
are more subject to both the positive and negative teacher expectancy effects than are
other students.
Researchers such as Steele (1992) have linked this form of differential treatment,
particularly for African American students, to school disengagement and disidentification
(the separation of one’s self-esteem from all forms of school-related feedback).
Steele argued that African American students become aware of the fact that teachers
and other adults have negative stereotypes of African Americans’ academic abilities.
This awareness (labeled stereotype threat by Steele and his colleagues) increases their
anxieties, which in turn lead them to disidentify with the school context to protect their
self-esteem. It is interesting that recent studies using the same theoretical notions and
experimental techniques have shown that Asian students believe that teachers and
adults expect them to perform very well and that this belief leads Asian students to perform
better on tests when their ethnic identity is made salient (Shih, Pittinsky, & Ambady,
1999). Thus, the psychological processes associated with stereotype threat can
either undermine or facilitate performance on standardized tests depending on the nature
of commonly held stereotypes about the intellectual strengths and weaknesses of
different social groups.
Classroom Climate
Classroom climate refers to the more general character of the classroom and teacherstudent
relationships within the classroom. In this section I focus on the following aspects
of classroom climate: Teacher-student relationships, classroom management, and
motivational climate.
Teacher-Student Relationships
Teacher-student relationships are a key component of classroom climate: High-quality
teacher-student relationships facilitate academic motivation, school engagement, academic
success, self-esteem, and more general socioemotional well-being (Deci & Ryan,
1985; Eccles et al., 1998; Goodenow, 1993; Midgley et al., 1989b; Roeser, Midgley, &
Urdan, 1996). Teachers who trust, care about, and are respectful of students provide
the social-emotional support that students need to approach, engage, and persist on
academic learning tasks and to develop positive achievement-related self-perceptions
and values. Feeling emotionally supported is one of the most important characteristics
of contexts that support positive development. Correlational studies with adoles-
Level 1: Classrooms 129
cents show that students’ perceptions of caring teachers enhance their feelings of selfesteem,
school belonging, and positive affect in school (Roeser & Eccles, 1998; Roeser
et al., 1996).
Declines in both adolescents’ perception of emotional support from their teachers
and in the adolescents’ sense of belonging in their classrooms are quite common as adolescents
move from elementary school into secondary schools (Eccles et al., 1998). This
shift is particularly troublesome in our highly mobile society in which teachers represent
one of the last stable sources of nonparental role models for adolescents. In addition
to teaching, teachers in mobile societies such as the United States can provide
guidance and assistance when social-emotional or academic problems arise. This role
is especially important for promoting developmental competence when conditions in
the family and neighborhood cannot or do not provide such supports (Eccles, Lord, &
Roeser, 1996; Simmons & Blyth, 1987).
Classroom Management
Work related to classroom management has focused on two general issues: orderliness/
predictability and control/autonomy. With regard to orderliness and predictability, the
evidence is quite clear: Student achievement and conduct are enhanced when teachers
establish smoothly running and efficient procedures for monitoring student progress,
providing feedback, enforcing accountability for work completion, and organizing
group activities (e.g., Eccles et al., 1998; Pintrich & Schunk, 1996). Unfortunately, such
conditions are often absent, particularly in highly stressed and underfunded schools
with inexperienced teachers (Darling-Hammond, 1997).
In addition, research on international comparisons of instruction suggest that
American teachers are often more lax in their classroom management and provide less
systematic and rigorous control over the instructional sequences (Stevenson & Stigler,
1992). Furthermore, this research suggests that these differences in teachers’ controlrelated
practices could be a partial explanation for the relatively poor performance of
many American youth on international standardized tests of math and science achievement
(Schmidt, McKnight, & Raizen, 1997).
Motivational Climate
Several teams of researchers have suggested that teachers engage in a wide range of behaviors
that create a pervasive motivational climate in the classroom. For example,
Rosenholtz and Simpson (1984) suggested a cluster of general teaching practices (e.g.,
individualized vs. whole-group instruction, ability grouping practices, and publicness
of feedback) that should affect motivation because these practices make ability differences
in classrooms especially salient to students (see Mac Iver, 1988). They assumed
that these practices affect the motivation of all students by increasing the salience of extrinsic
motivators and ego-focused learning goals, leading to greater incidence of social
comparison behaviors and increased perception of ability as an entity state rather than
an incremental condition. All of these changes reduce the quality of students’ motivation
and learning. The magnitude of the negative consequences of these shifts, however,
should be greatest for low-performing students: As these students become more aware
of their relative low standing, they are likely to adopt a variety of ego-protective strategies
that unfortunately undermine learning and mastery (Covington, 1992).
130 Schools, Academic Motivation, and Stage-Environment Fit
More recently, researchers interested in goal theory have proposed a similar set of
classroom characteristics (Ames, 1992; E. M. Anderman, & Maehr, 1994; Maehr &
Midgley, 1996; Pintrich & Schunk, 1996; Roeser, Midgley, & Maehr, 1994). Goal theorists
propose two major achievement goal systems: mastery-oriented goals and performanceoriented
goals. Students with mastery-oriented goals focus on learning the material
and on their own improvement over time. Students with performance-oriented goals
focus on doing better than other students in their class. Goal theorists further argue
that a mastery orientation sustains school engagement and achievement better than
does a performance orientation (see Ames, 1992; Maehr & Midgley, 1996; Midgley,
2002). Evidence is quite strong for the first prediction and more mixed for the second:
The desire to do better than others often has positive rather than negative consequences,
whereas the fear of failing (performance-avoidance goal orientation) undermines school
performance (see Midgley, 2002). Finally, these theorists suggest that the publicness of
feedback, particularly social comparative feedback, and a classroom focus on competition
between students undermine mastery motivation and increase performance motivation.
The school-reform work of Midgley, Maehr, and their colleagues has shown
that social reform efforts to reduce these types of classroom practices, particularly
those associated with performance feedback, social comparative grading systems, and
ego-focused, competitive motivational strategies have positive consequences for adolescents’
academic motivation, persistence on difficult learning tasks, and socioemotional
development (e.g., Maehr & Midgley, 1996).
The work on understanding group differences in achievement and achievement
choices is another example of an attempt to identify a broad set of classroom characteristics
related to motivation. The work on girls and math is one example of this approach.
There are sex differences in adolescents’ preference for different types of learning
contexts that likely interact with subject area to produce sex differences in interest
in different subject areas (Eccles, 1989; Hoffmann & Haeussler, 1995). Females appear
to respond more positively to math and science instruction if it is taught in a cooperative
or individualized manner rather than a competitive manner, if it is taught from an
applied or person-centered perspective rather than a theoretical or abstract perspective,
if it is taught using a hands-on approach rather than a book-learning approach,
and if the teacher avoids sexism in its many subtle forms. The reason given for these effects
is the fit between the teaching style, the instructional focus, and females’ values,
goals, motivational orientations, and learning styles. The few relevant studies support
this hypothesis (Eccles & Harold, 1993; Hoffmann & Haeussler, 1995). If such classroom
practices are more prevalent in one subject area (e.g., physical science or math)
than another (e.g., biological or social science), one would expect sex differences in motivation
to study these subject areas. In addition, however, math and physical science
do not have to be taught in these ways; more girl-friendly instructional approaches can
be used. When they are, girls, as well as boys, are more likely to continue taking courses
in these fields and to consider working in these fields when they become adults.
The girl-friendly classroom conclusion is a good example of person-environment fit.
Many investigators have suggested that students are maximally motivated to learn in
situations that fit well with their interests, current skill level, and psychological needs,
so that the material is challenging, interesting, and meaningful (e.g., Csikszentmihalyi,
Rathunde, & Whalen, 1993; Eccles et al., 1993; Krapp, Hidi, & Renninger, 1992). Vari-
Level 1: Classrooms 131
ations on this theme include aptitude by treatment interactions and theories stressing
cultural match or mismatch as one explanation for group differences in school achievement
and activity choices (e.g., Fordham & Ogbu, 1986; Suarrez-Orozco & Suarrez-
Orozco, 1995; Valencia, 1991). For example, Valencia (1991) concluded that a mismatch
of both the values of the school and the materials being taught contributed to
the poor performance and high dropout rates among Latino youth in the high school
they studied. Deyhle and LeCompte (1999) made a similar argument in their discussion
of the poor performance of Native American youth in traditional middle school contexts.
The misfit between the needs of young adolescents and the nature of junior high
school environments is another example of these person-environment fit dynamics.
The Nature of Academic Work
Academic work is at the heart of the school experience. Two aspects of academic tasks
are important: the content of the curriculum and the design of instruction. The nature
of academic content has an important impact on students’ attention, interest, and cognitive
effort. Long ago, Dewey (1902/1990) proposed that academic work that is meaningful
to the historical and developmental reality of students’ experiences will promote
sustained attention, high investment of cognitive and affective resources in learning,
and strong identification with educational goals and aims. In general, research supports
this hypothesis: Content that provides meaningful exploration is critical given
that boredom in school, low interest, and perceived irrelevance of the curriculum are
associated with poor attention, diminished achievement, disengagement, and alienation
from school (e.g., Finn, 1989; Jackson & Davis, 2000; Larson & Richards, 1989).
Curricula that represent the voices, images, and historical experiences of traditionally
underrepresented groups are also important (Valencia, 1991). Choosing materials that
provide an appropriate level of challenge for a given class, designing learning activities
that require diverse cognitive operations (e.g., opinion, following routines, memory,
comprehension), structuring lessons so that they build on each other in a systematic
fashion, using multiple representations of a given problem, and explicitly teaching students
strategies that assist in learning are but a few of the design features that scaffold
learning and promote effort investment, interest in learning, and achievement (Blumenfeld,
1992; Deci & Ryan, 1985; Eccles et al., 1998).
Unfortunately, American secondary schools have problems providing each of these
types of educational experiences. Recent work by Larson and his colleagues has documented
the fact that adolescents are bored most of the time that they are in secondary
school classrooms (Larson, 2000; Larson & Richards, 1989). Culturally meaningful
learning experiences are rare in many American secondary schools (Fine, 1991; Valencia,
1991). The disconnection of traditional curricula from the experiences of these
groups can explain the alienation of some group members from the educational process,
sometimes eventuating in school dropout (Fine, 1991; Sheets & Hollins, 1999).
Appropriately designed tasks that adequately scaffold learning are also rare in many
inner-city and poor schools (Darling-Hammond, 1997).
In addition, from a developmental perspective, there is evidence that the nature of
academic work too often does not change over time in ways that are concurrent with
the increasing cognitive sophistication, diverse life experiences, and identity needs of
132 Schools, Academic Motivation, and Stage-Environment Fit
adolescents as they move from the elementary into the secondary school years (Carnegie
Council, 1989; Lee & Smith, 2001). As one indication of this, middle school students
report the highest rates of boredom when doing schoolwork, especially passive work
(e.g., listening to lectures) and in particular classes such as social studies, math, and science
(Larson & Richards, 1989). There is also evidence that the content of the curriculum
taught in schools does not broaden to incorporate either important health or social
issues that become increasingly salient as adolescents move through puberty and
deal with the identity explorations associated with adolescence (Carnegie Council,
1989). Further, academic work sometimes becomes less, rather than more, complex in
terms of the cognitive demands as adolescents move from elementary to junior high
school (Eccles et al., 1998). It may be that declines in some adolescents’ motivation during
the transition to secondary school in part reflect academic work that lacks challenge
and meaning commensurate with adolescents’ cognitive and emotional needs (Eccles
& Midgley, 1989). Recent efforts at middle school reform support this hypothesis: motivation
is maintained when middle schools and junior high schools introduce more
challenging and meaningful academic work (Jackson & Davis, 2000). I discuss this in
more detail later.
Experiences of Racial-Ethnic Discrimination
Researchers interested in the relatively poor academic performance of adolescents
from some ethnic/racial groups have suggested another classroom-based experience as
critical for adolescent development, namely, experiences of racial/ethnic discrimination
(Essed, 1990; Feagin, 1992; Fordham & Ogbu, 1986; Garcia Coll et al., 1996; Rosenbaum,
Kulieke, & Rubinowitz, 1988; Ruggiero & Taylor, 1995; Taylor, Casten, Flickinger,
Roberts, & Fulmore, 1994; Wong, Eccles, & Sameroff, in press). Two types of
discrimination have been discussed: (a) anticipation of future discrimination in the labor
market, which might be seen as undermining the long-term benefits of education
(Fordham & Ogbu, 1986), and (b) the impact of daily experiences of discrimination on
one’s mental health and academic motivation (Essed, 1990; Wong et al., in press). Both
types are likely to influence adolescent development, but research on these issues is in
its infancy. Wong et al. (in press) found that anticipated future discrimination leads to
increases in African American youth’s motivation to do well in school, which in turn
leads to increases in academic performance. In this sample, anticipated future discrimination
appeared to motivate the youth to do their very best so that they would be maximally
equipped to deal with future discrimination. In contrast, daily experiences of
racial discrimination from their peers and teachers led to declines in school engagement
and confidence in one’s academic competence and grades, along with increases in
depression and anger.
Level 1: Summary
The studies of classroom-level influences suggest that development is optimized when
students are provided with challenging tasks in a mastery-oriented environment that
also provides good emotional and cognitive support, meaningful material to learn and
master, and sufficient support for their own autonomy and initiative. Connell and Well-
Level 1: Classrooms 133
born (1991), as well as Deci and Ryan (1985), suggested that humans have three basic
needs: to feel competent, to feel socially attached, and to have autonomous control in
their lives. Further, they hypothesized that individuals develop best in contexts that
provide opportunities for each of these needs to be met. Clearly, the types of classroom
characteristics that emerge as important for both socioemotional and intellectual development
would provide such opportunities.
LEVEL 2: SCHOOL BUILDINGS
Schools are formal organizations and, as such, have characteristics and features that
are superordinate to classroom characteristics. These aspects of the whole school environment
should impact on adolescents’ intellectual, social-emotional, and behavioral
development. Important school-level organizational features include school climate
and sense of community (Goodenow, 1993; Rutter, 1983) and the relationships among
the students themselves. School organizational features also include such schoolwide
practices as curricular tracking, start and stop times, and the availability of extracurricular
activities.
General Social Climate
Researchers have become interested in the social climate of the entire school. These researchers
suggest that schools vary in the climate and general expectations regarding
student potential and that such variations affect the development of both teachers and
students in very fundamental ways (e.g., Bandura, 1994; Bryk, Lee, & Holland, 1993;
Mac Iver, Reuman, & Main, 1995; Rosenbaum et al., 1988; Rutter, Maughan, Mortimore,
& Ouston, 1979). For example, in their analysis of higher achievement in Catholic
schools, Bryk et al. (1993) discussed how the culture within Catholic schools is fundamentally
different from the culture within most public schools in ways that positively
affect the motivation of students, parents, and teachers. This culture (school climate)
values academics, has high expectations that all students can learn, and affirms the belief
that the business of school is learning. Similarly, Lee and Smith (2001) showed that
between-school differences in teachers’ sense of their own personal efficacy as well as
their confidence in the general ability of the teachers at their school to teach all students
accounted, in part, for between-school differences in adolescents’ high school performance
and motivation. Finally, Bandura (1994) documented between-school differences
in the general level of teachers’ personal efficacy beliefs and argued that these differences
translate into teaching practices that undermine the motivation of many
students and teachers in the school.
Maehr, Midgley, and their colleagues argued that just as classroom practices give rise
to certain achievement goals, so too do schools through particular policies and practices.
A school-level emphasis on different achievement goals creates a schoolwide psychological
environment that affects students’ academic beliefs, affects, and behaviors
(e.g., Maehr & Midgley, 1996; Roeser et al., 1996). For example, schools’ use of public
honor rolls and assemblies for the highest achieving students, class rankings on report
cards, differential curricular offerings for students of various ability levels, and so on
134 Schools, Academic Motivation, and Stage-Environment Fit
all emphasize relative ability, competition, and social comparison in the school and create
a school-level ability rather than mastery/task focus. In contrast, through the recognition
of academic effort and improvement, rewards for different competencies that extend
to all students, and through practices that emphasize learning and task mastery
(block scheduling, interdisciplinary curricular teams, cooperative learning), schools
can promote a school-level focus on discovery, effort and improvement, and academic
mastery. The academic goal focus of a school also has important implications for students’
mental health. In a series of studies, Roeser and Eccles found that students’ belief
that their school is ability-focused leads to declines in students’ educational values,
achievement, and self-esteem and increases in their anger, depressive symptoms, and
school truancy as they move from seventh to eighth grade (Roeser & Eccles, 1998;
Roeser et al., 1998). Fiqueira-McDonough (1986) reported similar findings in a study
of two high schools that were similar in intake characteristics and achievement outcomes
but differed in their academic orientation and rates of delinquent behavior. The
high school characterized by a greater emphasis on competition and high grades (ability
orientation) had higher delinquency rates, and the students’ grades were a major
correlate of students’ involvement in delinquent behavior (low grades predicted increased
delinquent behavior). In contrast, in the school that had more diverse goals and
greater interest in non-academic needs, school attachment (valuing of school, liking
teachers) was greater on average, and those students with high school attachment engaged
in the least delinquent activity.
One final note on school-level academic goal emphases: They are strongly correlated
with adolescents’ perceptions of the school’s social climate. Adolescents who perceive
a task orientation in their school also report that their teachers are friendly, caring, and
respectful. These factors in turn predict an increased sense of belonging in school among
adolescents (see also Goodenow, 1993). In contrast, perceptions of a schoolwide ability
orientation are negatively correlated with adolescents’ perceptions of caring teachers
(Roeser et al., 1996). From the adolescents’ perspective, a deemphasis on comparison
and competition and an emphasis on effort and improvement are intertwined with
their view of caring teachers.
Academic Tracks and Curricular Differentiation
Another important school-level feature relates to academic tracks or curriculum differentiation
policies. These terms refer to the regularities in the ways in which schools
structure the learning experiences for different types of students (Oakes, Gamoran, &
Page, 1992). The practice of providing different educational experiences for students of
different ability levels is widespread in American schools. Tracking takes different
forms at different grade levels. It includes within-class ability grouping for different
subject matters or between-class ability grouping in which different types of students
are assigned to different teachers. Within-classroom ability grouping for reading and
math is quite common in elementary school. In secondary school, between-class tracking
is more widespread and is often linked to the sequencing of specific courses for students
bound for different post–secondary school trajectories (e.g., the college prep,
general, or vocational tracks). Differentiated curricular experiences for students of different
ability levels influence school experiences in two major ways: First, tracking de-
Level 2: School Buildings 135
termines the quality and kinds of instruction each student receives (Rosenbaum, 1976,
1980; Oakes et al., 1992), and second, it determines exposure to different peers and
thus, to a certain degree, the nature of social relationships that youth form in school
(Fuligni, Eccles, & Barber, 1995).
Despite years of research on the impact of tracking practices, few strong and definitive
answers have emerged (see Fuligni et al., 1995; Gamoran & Mare, 1989; Kulik &
Kulik, 1987; Slavin, 1990). The results vary depending on the outcome assessed, the
group studied, the length of the study, the control groups used for comparison, and the
specific nature of the context in which these practices are manifest. The best justification
for these practices, derived from a person-environment fit perspective, is the belief
that students are more motivated to learn if the material is adapted to their current
competence level. There is some evidence to support this view for students placed in
high ability and gifted classrooms, high within-class ability groups, and college tracks
(Dreeben & Barr, 1988; Fuligni et al., 1995; Gamoran & Mare, 1989; Kulik & Kulik,
1987; Pallas, Entwisle, Alexander, & Stluka, 1994).
The results for adolescents placed in low-ability and noncollege tracks are usually
inconsistent with this hypothesis. By and large, the effects found for this group of students
are negative (Dreeben & Barr, 1988; Pallas et al., 1994; Rosenbaum, 1976, 1980;
Rosenbaum et al., 1988; Vanfossen, Jones, & Spade, 1987). Low-track placement predicts
poor attitudes toward school, feelings of incompetence, and problem behaviors
both within school (nonattendance, crime, misconduct) and in the broader community
(drug use, arrests); it also predicts lower educational attainments (Oakes et al., 1992).
These negative effects reflect the fact that students placed in the lower tracks are often
provided with inferior educational experience and support.
Ability grouping also has an impact on students’ peer groups: Between-classroom
ability grouping and curricular tracking increase the extent of contact among adolescents
with similar levels of achievement and engagement with school. For those doing
poorly in school, tracking is likely to facilitate friendships among students who are similarly
alienated from school and are more likely to engage in risky or delinquent behaviors
(Dryfoos, 1990). Dishion, McCord, and Poulin (1999) showed experimentally how
such collecting of alienated adolescents increases their involvement in problem behaviors.
This collecting of adolescents with poor achievement or adjustment histories also
places additional discipline burdens on the teachers who teach these classes (Oakes et
al., 1992), making such classes unpopular with the teachers as well as the students and
decreasing the likelihood that the teachers with the most experience will allow themselves
to be assigned to these classes.
Concerns have also been raised about the way students get placed in different classes
and how difficult it is for students to change tracks once initial placements have been
made. These issues are important both early in a child’s school career (e.g., Entwisle &
Alexander, 1993) and later in adolescence, when course placement is linked directly to
the kinds of educational options that are available to the student after high school. Minority
youth, particularly African American and Latino boys, are more likely to be assigned
to low-ability classes and non-college-bound curricular tracks than are other
groups; furthermore, careful assessment of the placements has shown that many of
these youth were incorrectly assigned to these classes (Dornbusch, 1994; Oakes et al.,
136 Schools, Academic Motivation, and Stage-Environment Fit
1992). The consequences of such misassignment are great. It has long-term consequences
for students’ ability to go to college once they complete secondary school.