CHAPTER FOUR
Analysis
4.1 Introduction
This chapter discusses the findings based on the collected data from the surveyed youth, parents, and teachers. The main objective of this study is directed towards understanding the impact of mentoring programs on at-risk youth with respect to their academic performance and social behavior.
As discussed in the previous chapter, the data were gathered by means of a pre- and post- intervention questionnaire; the specific instrument used was the Child Behavior Checklist form. The Child Behavior Checklist forms were administered by the staff members of the mentoring agency, Fresh Start. Upon the participating students’ completion of the six-month mentoring program, the structured questionnaire was then distributed by the researcher to the parents of participating youth. In order to maintain the security of the data gathered using the survey form, the researcher personally reclaimed the completed questionnaires. Maintaining the confidentiality of all personal information and questionnaire data is of the utmost importance in obtaining positive and accurate responses to the questionnaires, as well as upholding ethical research standards. Therefore, by ensuring that all responses will remain confidential, it is possible that all information will be reliable for testing and evaluation purposes, and that the potential effectiveness of the mentoring program will not be compromised by falsified data or a weak research instrument.
The results of the data analysis performed by the research are presented in three distinct sections. The first part provides the results of the pre-intervention questionnaire data. The pre-intervention data are further sorted into three categories: the data from the youth surveys, data collected from the parents’ surveys, and data collected from the teachers’ surveys. The second section reports post-intervention questionnaire results, sorted into the same categories indicated in part one. The third and final section identifies and discusses the differences between the pre- and post- intervention questionnaires. The differences were identified by conducting a paired samples t-test.
4.2 Pre-intervention Child Behavior Checklist Results
4.2.1 Youth Questionnaire: Data and Discussion
Effective at-risk youth programs begin with determining the population that is going to be served. Once the target population has been identified, program staff begin to determine the kinds of programmatic designs that are most appropriate for at-risk youth, and they begin implementing the policies needed to support an effective high performance youth mentoring system. The following table illustrates the pre-intervention perception of the youth respondents regarding their behavior towards other people, the respondents’ themselves, and their perceptions of their own performance in academic subjects.
Table 1.Youth perceptions of their own behaviors
Statements
Worse
Average
Better
Mean
Standard Deviation
Compared to others of your age, how well do you:
Get along with your brothers and sisters?
70
117
13
2.285
0.57918
Get along with other kids?
70
118
12
2.29
0.57231
Get along with your parents?
88
104
8
2.4
0.5671
Do things by yourself?
105
85
10
2.475
0.59256
The data presented in the table indicate that the majority of students perceive themselves as average with respect to their interpersonal behavior. One hundred seventeen of 200 of the youth respondents consider themselves average in comparison to others of the same age when it comes to the quality of their relationship with their brothers and sisters. The results were almost identical for the second item presented in this table, the item that assessed students’ perceptions of their ability to get along well with other kids their age. Again, in the third item, we see a similar response pattern, although the student respondents’ responses indicate that they did acknowledge that they experienced greater difficult relating with their parents than with siblings or peers from their age cohort. The results for the final item presented in Table 1 were quite different from the preceding items, and allude to an interesting gap in student respondents’ perceptions. While they perceive themselves as average with respect to relating to others, the majority of respondents view themselves as significantly worse than their peers with respect to performing tasks independently. This gap in perception will be discussed at greater length in the analysis section of this chapter.
Table 2. Students’ perceptions of their academic performance
Performance in Academic Subjects
Failing
Below Average
Average
Above Average
Mean
Standard Deviation
English
18
48
134
0
2.42
0.65248
Math
72
69
53
6
3.035
0.86459
Science
48
40
94
18
2.59
0.95207
History
105
37
47
11
3.18
0.97589
Computer
41
69
61
29
2.61
0.97088
With respect to the perception of the respondents regarding their academic performance, it can be seen that the mean of their responses only ranged from two to three, which signifies that majority of the respondents believe that their academic performance is either below average or failing.
4.2.2 Parents
Parents play an important role in setting expectations about what actions constitute appropriate social behavior; parents also help their children to establish values and norms that define acceptable academic performance. Some mentoring programs recognize that effective interventions might also involve strategies for maximizing both the quality and the quantity of positive interactions between parents and their children. Although teachers are capable of producing profound and positive changes in student behaviors and learning by effectively modeling the positive processes, skills, and attitudes that students need to succeed, parents are still the first teachers of a child. Thus, parents are the best source of information when it comes to the behavior and academic performance of a child.
Table 3. Parents’ perceptions of their child’s behavior
Worse
Average
Better
Mean
Standard Deviation
Compared to others of his/her age, how well does your child:
Get along with your brothers and sisters?
78
108
14
2.32
0.5995
Get along with other kids?
101
87
12
2.445
0.6073
Behave with his/her parents?
90
102
8
2.41
0.56879
Play and work alone?
99
92
9
2.45
0.58241
As illustrated in Table 3, the majority of the parent respondents agreed that their children are average when it comes to interpersonal interactions, though there is a noticeable difference between the responses regarding in-family interactions and extra-familial exchanges. The majority of parent respondents also indicated that they perceive their children as worse than their children’s peers with respect to performing tasks independently, a response which is congruent with the youth respondents’ perceptions of themselves. The limited responses in the “better” category irrespective of the item requiring a response suggests that parents might believe that there would be possible positive changes if the child became involved in an intervention program, especially one involving youth mentoring.
Table 4. Parents’ perceptions of academic performance
Performance in Academic Subjects
Failing
Below Average
Average
Above Average
Mean
Standard Deviation
English
10
47
143
0
2.335
0.56956
Math
76
53
64
7
2.99
0.91876
Science
36
47
104
13
2.53
0.86187
History
95
20
80
5
3.025
0.98958
Computer
58
48
67
27
2.685
1.03495
While the results regarding parents’ perceptions of children’s academic performance seems to suggest that most parents consider their children to be average in all categories except math and history, the limited “Above Average” responses indicate that parents realize their children are academically at-risk. In this regard, the use of targeted interventions, such as the Fresh Start mentoring program, might increase the capabilities of their children to perform well in their academics.
4.2.3 Teachers
One of the responsibilities of the teacher is to maintain a high standard of personal and professional conduct. Considering that teaching involves varied relationships, it has become important to have specific rules of conduct that govern that teacher’s behavior in these relationships. In traditional school, the teacher is an important figure in the classroom. They are the source of knowledge and information. Because of this role, the teacher must be a subject matter expert and facilitates the achievement of desired academic and behavioral results in students. Teachers are also aware of the capacities of their students. Although parents’ and students’ perceptions are valuable sources of information, assessments of a child’s academic performance relies heavily upon the findings and perceptions of a teacher.
Table 5. Teachers’ perceptions of academic performance
Performance in Academic Subjects
Far below grade
Somewhat below grade
At grade level
Somewhat above grade
Far above grade
Mean
Standard Deviation
English
5
10
47
138
0
2.41
0.70312
Math
5
76
49
63
7
3.045
0.96833
Science
5
34
44
104
13
2.57
0.93244
History
8
94
20
73
5
3.135
1.04028
Computer
1
58
48
66
27
2.7
1.04665
As seen in Table 5, teachers perceive their students to be far more capable than both parents and students perceive with respect to academic performance. Teachers reported that most of the students perform well in their classes. In contrast to the parent and student data, most of the teachers reported that their students are somewhat above their chronological grade level. Most of the teachers seem to be optimistic in regards to the capabilities of their students. It is important to note, however, that the teacher response data are somewhat different in their assumptions than both the parent and student data. While student respondents evaluated themselves and parents evaluated their own child, the teacher respondent in this study was not considering a single student. Rather, the teacher respondent was considering his or her classroom as a whole. Therefore, the higher averages that are observed among the data presented in the table as compared to the averages in the parental and student response data might reflect a global set of perceptions. In other words, the teacher respondent was probably not thinking solely of at-risk students. Teachers’ positive impressions of higher performing students might have skewed the data in ways that the researcher cannot interpret or confirm with certainty.
4.3 Post-intervention Results
Of the 200 participants who agreed to participate in the study, 23 dropped out of the intervention program, resulting in an attrition rate of slightly more than 10%. Given the number of participants who did not complete the study, the post-intervention questionnaire data represent the responses of 177 participants. Since 23 subjects did not complete the intervention, there are differences between the pre- and post-intervention questionnaire results, and the overall integrity of the data may be affected slightly. Specifically, the confidence level with respect to accuracy may have been affected.
In the following tables, the data collected in the post-intervention questionnaires will be presented in the same order in which they were presented in the preceding section, where pre-intervention data were presented.
4.3.1 Youth
Table 6. Youth perceptions of their own behavior (post-intervention results)
Worse
Average
Better
Mean
Standard Deviation
Compared to others of your age, how well do you:
Get along with your brothers and sisters?
11
59
107
1.4576
0.61206
Get along with other kids?
14
48
114
1.4350
0.63739
Get along with your parents?
13
69
95
1.5367
0.63071
Do things by yourself?
10
79
88
1.5593
0.60126
In the post-intervention questionnaire, student respondents exhibited improved perceptions of themselves overall when compared to the pre-intervention data.
Table 7.Perceptions of their academic performance (post-intervention results)
Performance in Academic Subjects
Failing
Below Average
Average
Above Average
Mean
Standard Deviation
English
5
7
48
117
1.4350
0.70511
Math
6
2
116
53
1.7797
0.63249
Science
3
2
75
97
1.4972
0.61352
History
3
4
121
49
1.7797
0.56612
Computer
3
3
92
79
1.6045
0.61384
From the results of the post-survey, it is evident to say that mentoring programs provides a positive impact as viewed by the youth. Actually, the results in tables 6 and 7 provide a better development in comparison to pre-survey results.
4.3.2 Parents
Table 8. Parents’ perceptions of their child’s behavior (post-intervention results)
Worse
Average
Better
Mean
Standard Deviation
Compared to others of his/her age, how well does your child:
Get along with his/her brothers and sisters?
87
79
11
1.5706
0.60943
Get along with other kids?
4
87
86
1.5367
0.54362
Behave with his/her parents?
3
91
83
1.548
0.53216
Play and work alone?
7
133
37
1.8305
0.47022
The results presented in Table 8 represent a dramatic and statistically significant shift when considered in comparison to the pre-intervention responses of parents in this category. The one exception to this observation is the item that questions parent respondents about their perceptions regarding their child’s relationships with siblings. Curiously, the response array pattern in the post-intervention questionnaire points to a worsening in the sibling relationship, rather than an improvement. The psychological and familial dynamics that may explain such a response will be discussed at greater length later in this chapter.
Table 9. Perceptions of academic performance of their child (post-intervention results)
Performance in Academic Subjects
Failing
Below Average
Average
Above Average
Mean
Standard Deviation
English
11
19
105
42
1.9944
0.77237
Math
15
13
110
39
2.0226
0.79740
Science
19
19
117
22
2.1977
0.79085
History
17
32
81
47
2.1073
0.90755
Computer
40
20
103
40
2.0452
0.81058
With respect to the post-intervention results of the perception of the parents regarding their child’s academic performance, the data indicate a positive trend of improvement. Thus, the researcher may conclude that the majority of the parent respondents might attribute improved academic performance to the Fresh Start mentoring program in which the child participated.
4.3.3 Teacher
Table 10. Teachers’ perceptions of academic performance (post-intervention results)
Performance in Academic Subjects
Far below grade
Somewhat below grade
At grade level
Somewhat above grade
Far above grade
Mean
Standard Deviation
English
5
8
37
4
123
1.6893
1.1178
Math
3
6
44
60
64
2.0056
0.95046
Science
4
5
33
32
103
1.7288
1.00844
History
8
6
18
83
62
1.9548
0.99897
Computer
1
9
45
38
84
1.8983
0.98906
In regards to the academic performance of the students as perceived by their teachers, the results in post-survey also indicate a perception that academic achievement and competency have improved. Although the results in the pre-intervention questionnaire were far more positive than the results in similar categories of both students and their parents– an outcome which was attributed to the fact that teacher respondents are evaluating their entire classes and not just at-risk students– the results of the post-intervention questionnaire surpassed the researcher’s expectations for anticipated improvements in this particular response category. As shown in Table 10, teacher respondents report that the majority of their students now perform far above average. While the researcher acknowledges that there may be other confounding variables which produced positive improvements in the students’ academic achievements as perceived by their teachers, the researcher believes it is safe to assume that at least some of the improvement is attributable to the Fresh Start mentoring program.
4.4 Comparison of Pre- and Post- Intervention Results: Analysis and Discussion
To verify and validate the data presented in the preceding tables, the use of a t-test was performed. To evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention program and determine the statistical significance of the differences between the pre- and post- intervention questionnaire responses, the use of a paired-sample t-test in the computed mean was employed. The t-test is the most commonly used method to evaluate the differences in means between two groups. For example, the t-test can be used to test for a difference in test scores between a group of patients that was administered a pharmacological intervention and a control group whose members received a placebo. Theoretically, the t-test can be used even if the sample sizes are very small (e.g., as small as 10; some researchers claim that even smaller N’s are possible) (, & 2001; ), as long as the variables are normally distributed within each group and the variation of scores in the two groups is not different. As mentioned previously, the normality assumption can be evaluated by looking at the distribution of the data (via histograms) or by performing a normality test. The equality of variances assumption can be verified with the F test, or the Levene’s test, which is considered more robust, can be used. In this regard, the researcher can evaluate the differences in means between two groups using one of the nonparametric alternatives to the t- test (, & 2001; ).
The p-level reported with a t-test represents the probability of error involved in accepting the research hypothesis about the existence of a difference. Technically speaking, the p-level represents the probability of error associated with rejecting the hypothesis of no difference between the two categories of observations (corresponding to the groups) in the population when, in fact, the hypothesis is true(, & 2001; ).
, & (2001) suggest that if the difference is in the predicted direction, the researcher can consider only one half (one “tail”) of the probability distribution and thus divide the standard p-level reported with a t-test (a “two-tailed” probability) by two. However, (1994) suggests that the researcher should always report the standard, two-tailed t-test probability. When testing for a relationship between two variables, sometimes there is a third variable, that can influence the results.
4.4.1 Youth
Table 11.Summary of Means (Youth Perceptions)
Pre-intervention
Post-intervention
Get along with your brothers and sisters?
2.28
1.4576
Get along with other kids?
2.29
1.4350
Get along with your parents?
2.40
1.5367
Do things by yourself?
2.48
1.5593
English
2.42
1.4350
Math
3.04
1.7797
Science
2.59
1.4972
History
3.18
1.7797
Computer
2.61
1.6045
Overall Mean
2.5872223
1.5649667
Table 12. Samples statistics (youth)
Mean
N
Std. Deviation
Std. Error Mean
PRE
2.5872
200
0.31775
0.10592
POST
1.565
177
0.1344
0.0448
Tables 11 and 12 display the number of cases, mean value, standard deviation, and standard error for the pair(s) of variables compared in the Samples T Test procedure. Since the Samples T Test compares the means for the two variables, it is useful to know what the mean values are. Based on the data included in the presentations above, the overall computed means for pre- and post- intervention questionnaires are 2.5872 and 1.5650, respectively.
Table 13. Samples T-Test (youth)
Mean (pre- and post-)
1.0223
Std. Deviation
0.19572
Std. Error Mean
0.06524
95% Confidence Interval of the Difference
Lower
0.8718
Upper
1.1727
t-value
15.67
Sig. (2-tailed)
0.000
As previously discussed, the Paired-Samples T Test procedure compares the means of two variables that represent the same group at different times (e.g. before and after an event, such as the mentoring intervention used in the present study) or related groups. The mean values for the two variables are displayed in the Paired Samples Statistics table. Since there is a low significance value for the t test (typically less than 0.05), which is 0.000, then it indicates that there is a significant difference between the two variables (pre- and post- intervention results as reported by survey respondents). In addition, if the confidence interval for the mean difference does not contain zero, this also indicates that the difference is significant.
4.4.2 Parents
Table 14. Summary of Means (Parent Perceptions)
Pre-intervention
Post-intervention
Get along with his/her brothers and sisters?
2.32
1.5706
Get along with other kids?
2.445
1.5367
Behave with his/her parents?
2.41
1.548
Do things along?
2.45
1.8305
English
2.335
1.9944
Math
2.99
2.0226
Science
2.53
2.1977
History
3.025
2.1073
Computer
2.685
2.0452
Overall Mean
2.60875
1.9103
Table 15. Samples Statistics (Parent)
Mean
N
Std. Deviation
Std. Error Mean
PRE
2.5767
200
0.26721
0.08907
POST
1.8726
177
0.25958
0.08653
With regards to the overall perceptions reported by the parents who participated in the study, Tables 14 and 15 display the summary statistics. The computed values for the pre- and post- intervention questionnaire are 2.5767 and 1.8726, respectively. These computed values of mean and standard deviation were used to run the paired samples t-test.
Table 16. Samples Test (Parent)
Mean (pre- and post-)
0.7041
Std. Deviation
0.24117
Std. Error Mean
0.08039
95% Confidence Interval of the Difference
Lower
0.5187
Upper
0.8895
t-value
8.759
Sig. (2-tailed)
0.000
Table 16 illustrates the results of a sample t-test. The computed t-value was 8.759, with a 0.000 significance level. Using these results, the study revealed that there was a significant difference between the perceptions of parents prior to the intervention and after the intervention, as indicated by the comparative analysis of their survey results.
4.4.3 Teachers
Table 17. Summary of Means (Teachers’ Perceptions)
Pre-intervention
Post-intervention
English
2.41
1.6893
Math
3.045
2.0056
Science
2.57
1.7288
History
3.135
1.9548
Computer
2.7
1.8983
Overall Mean
2.7720
1.8554
Table 18. Samples Statistics (Teachers)
Mean
N
Std. Deviation
Std. Error Mean
PRE
2.7720
200
0.30957
0.13844
POST
1.8554
177
0.13955
0.06241
The overall perceptions of the teacher respondents in regards to academic performance of their students are displayed in Tables 17 and 18. The computed values for the pre- and post- intervention questionnaires survey are 2.7720 and 1.8554, respectively. These computed values of mean and standard deviation were used to run the samples t-test.
Table 19. Samples Test (Teachers)
Mean (pre- and post-)
0.9166
Std. Deviation
0.18830
Std. Error Mean
0.08421
95% Confidence Interval of the Difference
Lower
0.6828
Upper
1.1504
t-value
10.885
Sig. (2-tailed)
0.000
Table 19 indicates the results of a sample t-test based on the perceptions of teachers with regards to the academic performance of their students. The computed t-value was 10.885, with a 0.000 significance level. By analyzing these results, the researcher determined that there is a significant difference between the perceptions of teachers when their pre- and post- intervention questionnaire results are compared. The results thus seem to suggest that mentoring programs among at-risk youth provide positive benefits that improve both behavioral and academic performance.
References:
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