Student Mobility (kids who change schools frequently)

What is Student Mobility?

Student mobility is a student's frequent changing of schools, also referred to as “transience” or “churn” (Sparks, 2020). Student mobility can be voluntary or involuntary. The voluntary reasons could include changing schools to participate in a different program, and involuntary reasons could include expulsion or bullying (Sparks, 2020). Another reason can be a change in residence due to a parent's change in job, eviction, or parental divorce (Rumberger, 2015). Homelessness is another reason for a student to become mobile. Homelessness is most commonly found in rural or urban areas and seems to impact the African American and Hispanic communities the most (Cowen, 2017). Any of the factors that lead to student mobility can have detrimental effects on a student’s learning.

How does Student Mobility affect students?

Student mobility can be detrimental to a student. It can result in lower test scores, particularly in math and reading. It can also impact the timeframe for a student's graduation or lead to dropping out of high school in some cases ( Sparks, 2020; Rumberger, 2015).This low performance tends to occur due to the highly mobile student not being engaged (Sparks, 2020). This lack of engagement could be due to a student and their family having a lack of interest in committing to long-term thinking (Fowler-Finn, 2019). Homelessness has also proven to have a negative impact on student education. In a Michigan study, homeless students scored far lower than their peers in their school, district, and state on Michigan’s standardized testing (Cowen, 2017). Student mobility has shown to have an effect on elementary school aged children’s academic performance due to the disruption happening during a time of the student learning critical skills that are needed for later learning (Gruman et al., 2008). The effects of student mobility have made one thing clear, ways to lessen the impact need to be a part of the conversation.

What can be done to lessen the impact of Student Mobility?

Many things are being attempted to lessen the impact student mobility has on students. For example, under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), school districts must allow a homeless student to attend their original school unless a transfer is requested by a parent (Sparks, 2020). There are other things that have been implemented that seem successful such as, a better system of transferring data between schools, a speedy process for that data to be transferred, and support from other agencies (Spark, 2020). Other suggestions include making the quality of the schools better, changing the way suspension and expulsion happens at a school, and having programs put into place to ease a transition if a school closing is unavoidable (Rumberger, 2015). Gruman et al. (2008) suggests that teacher support has also proven to be helpful with student mobility. Any of these ideas could hopefully lessen the burden that mobility puts on students and their families and show them that they are cared for regardless of circumstance.

Final Thoughts

According to Gruman et al.(2008) student mobility has shown to have an impact on a student's performance in academics and behavior in the classroom, but it has not shown to impact a student’s attitude toward school. I find this to correlate with my own personal experience with student mobility. I went to about 6 different elementary schools as a child, and I do not believe that the mobility had an impact on my attitude toward school. I also agree with the findings of Sparks (2020) when she references that student engagement could be low due to the family not wanting to have a long- term commitment. Being that I was a mobile student in elementary school, I did not engage in any extracurricular activities until middle school. I do not believe that being a mobile student is always detrimental. While there are proven effects, like lower test scores and low participation in the classroom, I do not believe this is the case for every mobile student. Not every move is to a worse school, in my experience, and I went to quite a few better schools than others I had experienced. My grades did not suffer dramatically and I did graduate with an advanced studies diploma in high school. In conclusion, there are downsides to student mobility that we should be aware of, but the downsides are not the case for everyone.

Questions

1. Mrs. Smith has started to notice that her student, Tommy, has not been participating in class, has dropped out of extra curriculars and has been fighting with classmates. Mrs. Smith recently found out that Tommy's parent's divorced and he will be switching schools. Tommy's behavior is a result of what?

A. Being mad at his parent's.

B. His feelings toward the change that is about to occur.

C. Not liking Mrs. Smith's teaching style.

D. Not liking his friends.

2. Speedy data transfers, teacher support, and allowing a homeless student to stay at their original school are examples of?

A. Ways to assist homeless students.

B. Ways for schools to improve administrative work.

C. Ways to lessen the impact of Student Mobility.

Answers to Questions

1. B

2. C