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Among the many factors that impact student performance in traditional K-12 settings, parent involvement (PI) is consistently identified as critical for student success. However, less is known about parent involvement for full-time virtual schools, where most learning takes place asynchronously in a Learning Management System (LMS). The present study attempts to close this gap by using data from three virtual schools' LMS to measure the impact of parent involvement on mathematics achievement, across grade bands where PI is known to vary. After controlling for factors known to impact education outcomes, parental involvement - as measured by LMS logins - had a small, but positive, impact on student performance in mathematics across elementary, middle, and high school. These results, coupled with the elevated role of the parent, suggest that parental involvement is just as critical, if not more so, in virtual schools as in traditional settings.

The relationship between student activity data and performance in the online classroom is well-documented, yet the parameters of this relationship and their implications for K-12 online schools are not yet well understood. This study examined the role of student chronotype (defined here as the time of day a student is most active in an online course) and overall activity level on course performance. Clickstream data captured by a Learning Management System from 414 students enrolled in an eleventh-grade English course in the fall of 2018 at two Midwestern full-time K-12 virtual schools were used to determine chronotype and activity level. Students were classified as one of four possible chronotypes given the mode of their click activity. Results of an ANCOVA showed that students who were most active in the morning significantly outperformed students who were most active in the afternoon and evening. Morning students also tended to be the most active overall. The results of a hierarchical regression revealed that, while chronotype was related to student performance, total student activity had an even greater impact on performance suggesting an interesting interplay between the two factors.

This cluster-randomized pre-post study examined the effectiveness of Character Playbook, a digitally delivered, universal social-emotional learning (SEL) program, in enhancing social and emotional knowledge and confidence among rural middle school students. Pre- and post-assessments and surveys measured students' knowledge and selfreported confidence related to social and emotional skills. The sample consisted of 128 students from two rural middle schools. Analyses of covariance with multiple imputations to account for missing data revealed that students who participated in Character Playbook demonstrated significantly higher knowledge and more positive confidence toward their social and emotional learning competency than the control group. These findings, with acknowledged limitations, suggest that Character Playbook holds promise as an effective SEL program for rural middle school students, but further research is needed for confirmation. The study provides valuable preliminary insights into how a brief, digitally delivered, universal SEL program could benefit students in rural classrooms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]