Utilization of a High Stakes High School Graduation Exam to Assess the Impact of Agricultural Education: A Measure of Curriculum Integration

Phipps, Osborne, Dyer, and Ball , (2008) posited that, “Agricultural education in secondary schools has played an important role in enhancing student achievement in the core subject areas...” (p. 4), while Enderlin and Osborne (1992) reported that agricultural students received higher test scores in biology than students in other science classes. However, further evaluation of this academic integration is warranted to determine which practices are most beneficial to students. This study sought to determine if there was a relationship between the number of agricultural education classes that students took and the subsequent outcomes on the Alabama High School Graduation Exam. To address the research question, binary logistic regression was employed. Results indicated that the model did predict the outcomes on the language and math portion of the exam while the model failed to predict outcomes on the social studies, biology, and reading portions of the exam. This study should be replicated using standardized tests in other states. Comparable data should be collected for students not enrolled in agriculture classes so that the groups mean scores could be compared.