Improve the school climate for military children, districts urged

About 1.5 million children of military families attend U.S. public schools, and when they enroll in a new school, they often find classes and extracurricular activities already filled up and have a hard time making new friends, says Enhancing School Environment: Strategies That Work, a study funded by the U.S. Department of Defense Military Child in Transition and Deployment State Liaison Office.

Children from military families and other transient children are at social and academic risk if school leaders don’t take proactive steps to ensure their well-being, says the report’s author, professor Robert Blum, chair of the Department of Population and Family Health Sciences at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Transient children have an overwhelming burden placed on them as they try to adjust to constantly changing social and academic environments, Blum said. The resulting stress can cause them to feel disconnected to their school and community.

“Many of our schools are failing to support transient students, who simply fall through the cracks,” Blum said.

The report recommends the following steps to improve the school climate for all students:

• Promote a caring, respectful school environment through small learning settings, which foster more interaction, and provide mentors or advisers to individual students or groups.

• Develop high expectations for student achievement and provide tutoring and other support.

• Create a disciplinary system -- using input from students, parents, and staff -- with clear expectations and consequences. Encourage and reward participation from all students, elicit questions, and promote critical thinking and open debate.

• Create opportunities for students to contribute and take responsibility through such activities as peer-tutoring, peer-mentoring, and after-school programs.

Students who feel they are part of their school community are more likely to get better grades, enjoy learning, have better attendance records, and graduate, the report says. And they are “less likely to experience emotional distress or to engage in destructive behavior, such as drinking or using drugs.”

The report also offers the following recommendations to help military and other transient children adust:

• Develop an academic plan students can take from school to school to help them meet all graduation requirements.

• Enroll military students in the best classes they can handle -- not the leftovers -- and acknowledge previous achievements, such as membership in the National Honor Society.

• Reserve extracurricular spots for transfer students.