A Randomized Study to Abate Truancy and Violence in Grades 3-9 in Chicago Public Schools

• Change in attendance and truancy [ Time Frame: 2 times a year (on average every 6 months) during the intervention and 1 time a year each year following the completion of the intervention for up to 25 years ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  Attendance and truancy measured through school records on absences
  
  

• Criminal activity and involvement [ Time Frame: 1 time a year each year following the completion of the intervention for up to 25 years ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  Criminal activity and involvement using criminal records will include individual-level administrative data on juvenile arrests from the Chicago Police Department and Cook County juvenile court records
  
  
• Employment history and workforce involvement [ Time Frame: 1 time a year each year following the completion of the intervention for up to 25 years ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  Employment outcomes using employment records will include formal labor market involvement as measured by quarterly unemployment insurance (UI) records from the Illinois Department of Employment Security
  
  
• Health and medical system participation [ Time Frame: 1 time a year each year following the completion of the intervention for up to 25 years ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  Health outcomes using health records will include Medicaid records on eligibility and service use from the Medicaid Analytic eXtract (MAX)
  
  
• Academic achievement [ Time Frame: 1 time a year each year during the intervention and 1 time a year each year following the completion of the intervention for up to 25 years ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  Academic achievement measured through school records will include grades received in school and scores on standardized achievement tests (Iowa Test of Basic Skills in reading and math)
  
  
• School engagement [ Time Frame: 1 time a year each year during the intervention and 1 time a year each year following the completion of the intervention for up to 25 years ] [ Designated as safety issue: No ]
  School engagement measured through school records will include disciplinary actions/referrals
  
  

High school graduation is tremendously protective against involvement with crime and violence, as well as against the risk of adult poverty, unemployment, and poor health. Most of the policy and research attention on dropout has focused on the dropout decision itself. Yet dropout is almost always the end point of a longer-term developmental process. For this project the investigators have raised nearly $7 million in external support from the U.S. Department of Education, the National Institutes of Health, and the William T. Grant Foundation to learn more about the relative effectiveness of preventing dropout by trying to re-engage children in school much earlier during their academic careers.

Specifically, this project is motivated by findings from the late University of Chicago sociologist James Coleman indicating that one of the strongest protective factors against school failure for children is having a strong relationship with a pro-social adult - something that far too many children do not currently have, particularly those growing up in distressed family and community environments. The investigators are partnering with other researchers at Northwestern, Duke, and the University of Minnesota to test at large scale the effects of a structured mentoring and monitoring programs called Check & Connect. To date, the project has completed its pilot year, and starting this academic year will work with nearly 500 elementary and middle school students distributed across 23 CPS schools on the West and South sides of the city. Students will receive Check & Connect assistance for two academic years total.