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Description & Citation--Study No. 9389

Bibliographic Description

ICPSR Study No.:9389
 
Persistent URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR09389
 
Title:National Education Longitudinal Study, 1988
 
Principal Investigator(s):United States Department of Education. National Center for Education Statistics
 
Series:National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS) Series
 
Bibliographic Citation:U.S. Dept. of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. NATIONAL EDUCATION LONGITUDINAL STUDY, 1988 [Computer file]. Chicago, IL: National Opinion Research Center [producer], 1989. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 1990. doi:10.3886/ICPSR09389
 

Scope of Study

Summary:This collection represents the first stage of a major longitudinal effort to provide trend data about critical transitions experienced by students as they leave elementary school and progress through high school and into college or their careers. The 1988 eighth-grade cohort will be followed at two-year intervals as this group passes through high school and postsecondary education. The longitudinal data collected will yield policy-relevant information about educational processes and outcomes, early and later predictors of dropping out, and students' access to programs and equal opportunity. The study has four types of data files. The Parent Component was designed to collect information about the factors that influence educational attainment and participation, including questions exploring family background and socioeconomic conditions and character of the home educational system. The School Administrator component was designed to gather general descriptive information about the educational settings in which the surveyed students were enrolled in the winter and spring of 1988. These data were collected from the chief administrator of each base-year school and concern school characteristics, grading and testing structure, school culture and academic climate, program and facilities information, parental interactions and involvement, and teaching staff characteristics. The Student Component collected information on school work, aspirations, social relationships, and basic achievement areas such as reading, mathematics, science, and social studies. The Teacher Component provided data that could be used to analyze the behaviors and outcomes of the student sample. Teachers were surveyed about the base-year students' characteristics and performance in the classroom, curriculum and classes for eighth graders, and teacher demographics, professional characteristics, and relationships with other teachers, students, and parents.
 
Subject Term(s):adolescents, academic achievement, cognitive functioning, curriculum, educational testing, educational trends, family background, educational environment, educational opportunities, home environment, junior high school students, learning, school attendance, socioeconomic status, student participation, teacher student relationship, test scores
 
Geographic Coverage:United States
 
Time Period:1988
 
Date(s) of Collection:1988 - 1989
 
Universe:All eligible eighth graders in spring 1988.
 
Data Type:survey data, and event/transaction data
 
Data Collection Notes:SPSS Control Cards accompany each data file.
 

Methodology

Sample:A two-stage stratified probability sampling design was used to select a nationally representative sample of schools and students. The first stage resulted in 1,734 school selections with 1,052 participating schools, including 815 public and 237 private schools. The second stage produced a random selection of 26,435 students among the sampled schools, resulting in participation by 24,599 eighth-grade students.
 
Data Source:personal interviews, and test scores
 

Access and Availability

Note:A list of the data formats available for this study can be found in the summary of holdings. Detailed file-level information (such as record length, case count, and variable count) is listed in the file manifest.
 
Original ICPSR Release:1990-12-04
 
Version History:The last update of this study occurred on 2006-01-18.
 
  2006-01-18 - File CB9389.ALL.PDF was removed from any previous datasets and flagged as a study-level file, so that it will accompany all downloads.
 
Dataset(s):
  • DS1: Parent Component
  • DS2: Parent Data SAS Cards
  • DS3: School Component
  • DS4: School Component SAS Cards
  • DS5: Student Component
  • DS6: Student Data SAS Cards
  • DS7: Teacher Component
  • DS8: Teacher Component SAS Cards