Making the Change From Elementary to Middle School

The transition from elementary to middle school is a critical time that is considered to be one of the most difficult for students due to environmental adjustments, psychological distress, and developmental changes. The following study explores whether a basic transitional program, in comparison to a minimal transitional program, would be beneficial to students transitioning from elementary to middle school. Public, aggregated attendance records, office discipline referral records, and students’ Criterion-Referenced Competency Tests (CRCT) math and reading scores were examined using a convenience sample of two comparable middle schools’ sixth-grade classes in Middle Georgia. A chi- square was used to see if implementation of a basic transitional program was statistically significant. Two out of three null hypotheses were rejected: The first hypothesis, regarding the positive impact of a basic transitional program on academics, was very statistically significant, and the third hypothesis about the effect of the basic transitional program on students’ suspension rates was also extremely statistically significant.