Abstract for: Re-Imagining Educational Policy Development Assisting Highly Mobile Students in America

Highly mobile students are a unique population in America’s schools. These are students who move frequently, change schools with those moves, and who are at increased risk for developing gaps in their learning where they do not learn a concept or skill because of their frequent transitions. While notable differences among different types of highly mobile students exist, the cycles of educational interruption and their negative impacts are remarkably similar among these diverse students and largely unaddressed in the American educational system. This research employs system dynamics to identify the similar underlying structures consistent among highly mobile students, all with the goal of advocating for an alternate approach to writing educational policy that local school districts and state departments of education can employ in order to serve greater numbers of these students using fewer policy interventions.