Melissa Roderick

Melissa Roderick is the Hermon Dunlap Smith Professor at the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice. Melissa is an expert in urban school reform, high school reform, high-stakes testing, minority adolescent development, and school transitions. Her work has focused attention on the transition to high school as a critical point in students’ school careers and her new work examines the transition to college among Chicago Public School (CPS) students. In prior work, she led a multi-year evaluation of Chicago's initiative to end social promotion and has conducted research on school dropout, grade retention, and the effects of summer programs. Melissa is an expert in mixing qualitative and quantitative methods in evaluation. Her new study focuses on understanding the relationship between students' high school careers and preparation, their college selection choices and their post-secondary outcomes through linked quantitative and qualitative research. In this joint project with CPS, Melissa is assisting CPS in tracking successive cohorts of Chicago students and building new indicators through analysis of high school transcripts and surveys of students and teachers to assess the preparation of CPS graduates for college. She is concurrently leading a qualitative study that is following over 100 juniors from three Chicago high schools from the eleventh grade to two years after graduation and examining differences in the educational demands of their classroom environments through a linked study of high school and college classrooms. From 2001 to 2003, Melissa joined the administration of CPS to establish a new Department of Planning and Development. At the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice, Melissa is the faculty director of a new program in community schools and youth development. She is a founding board member and currently serves as the chair of the board of North Lawndale College Preparatory Charter High School.

Featured Publications

All Publications

Title Type Date Sort ascending
The Preventable Failure The Preventable Failure

Improvements in High School Graduation Rates when High Schools Focus on the Ninth-Grade Year

Working Paper Sep 2021
From High School to the Future From High School to the Future

Delivering on the Dream of College Graduation

Working Paper Nov 2018
The College Match Indicator

Linking Research to Practice

Book Sep 2016
Preventable Failure: Improvements in Long-Term Outcomes When High Schools Focused on the Ninth Grade Year: Research Summary Preventable Failure

Improvements in Long-Term Outcomes When High Schools Focused on the Ninth Grade Year

Report Apr 2014
Readiness for College: The Role of Noncognitive Factors and Context Readiness for College

The Role of Noncognitive Factors and Context

Article Nov 2013
From High School to the Future: The Challenge of Senior Year in Chicago Public Schools From High School to the Future

The Challenge of Senior Year in Chicago Public Schools

Report Feb 2013
Teaching Adolescents to Become Learners: The Role of Noncognitive Factors in Shaping School Performance Teaching Adolescents to Become Learners

The Role of Noncognitive Factors in Shaping School Performance

Literature Review Jun 2012
Working to My Potential: The Postsecondary Experiences of CPS Students in the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme Working to My Potential

The Postsecondary Experiences of CPS Students in the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme

Report Mar 2012
Potholes on the Road to College:  High School Effects in Shaping Urban Students' Participation in College Application, Four-year College Enrollment, and College Match Potholes on the Road to College

High School Effects in Shaping Urban Students' Participation in College Application, Four-year College Enrollment, and College Match

Article Jul 2011
From High School to the Future: Making Hard Work Pay Off From High School to the Future

Making Hard Work Pay Off

Report Apr 2009
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