National Soft Skills Association

To promote and enhance programs that increase soft skills

Study: Boosting Soft Skills Is Better Than Raising Test Scores

By 139 Comments

A recent study was just released by Northwestern University’s Kirabo Jackson on the effect of soft skills vs test scores. This study demonstrates that schools that build social-emotional qualities are getting better short-term and long-term results for students than schools that only focus on improving test scores.

https://hechingerreport.org/early-research-focuses-on-schools-that-develop-students-social-emotional-qualities/

This study included 150,000 high school students in all 133 Chicago Public Schools from 2008 onward, and reported that schools putting soft skills ahead of test scores produced students with higher grades, fewer absences and fewer disciplinary problems and arrests in high school. The students who attended these high schools also graduated and went to college at higher rates .

Another focus of the study was on two problematic behaviors—attendance and disciplinary incidents with ninth graders from 2011-2017. The results showed that schools emphasizing soft skills over test scores had fewer absences as well as disciplinary incidents. For students who entered ninth grade between 2011-2014, researchers found that students who attended schools focusing on soft skills had fewer arrests during their high school years and graduated in higher numbers.

Jackson says, “You could actually do a lot more good by focusing on schools that promote social-emotional development as opposed to focusing on schools that focus on test scores.”

In February of 2020, Jackson presented the findings at a conference for the National Center for the Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Educational Research (CALDER). There are four co-authors from The University of Chicago Consortium on School Research, Northwestern University and Mindset Scholars Network.

About the Author

National Soft Skills Association™ (NSSA) is a national clearing house on past and present research and to identify the best practices within the soft skills field.

Comments

  16. rahma says

    Very nice blog and articles. I am really very happy to visit your blog. Now I am found which I actually want. I check your blog everyday and try to learn something from your blog. Thank you and waiting for your new post.

    Reply

  29. vfmseo says

    Very informative post ! There is a lot of information here that can help any business get started with a successful social networking campaign !

    Reply

  139. Hawkeye 2021 Collection says

    Within the twenty-first century, no one ought to work for gratis, and you have got to pay for quality benefit. Be that as it may, men have certain points of interest within the handle of collaboration with organization managers.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.