maths statis project
I Introduction to the life skills data set: One of the dilemmas that many students face is transferring from middle school to high school. One of the local high schools in Los Angeles designed a “life skills” class to help the students in this process. The intention was to teach the students a certain set of skills that would make this transition more smooth and manageable. These skills included conflict resolution, time management, goal getting, goal setting, peer mediation, counseling, inter-cultural and inter-ethnic relations, and similar issues. A study was designed to evaluate the impact of this class on students’ perceptions of their self-esteem, their locus of control (attribution of success or failure to one’s efforts rather than outside factors such as chance and important others), and their attitude toward issues such as goal setting, relations with other ethnic groups, high school education, teachers, their friends and similar issues. It was not possible to have a control group because all the 9th grades were taking the class. The design used was a pretest-post-test design. The students were tested on their attitudes and perceptions before the class started and after it finished. The variables tested and how they were measured is reported in the following codebook.
LIFE SKILLS DATA SET: Variable
Column No.
Description
ID
1 – 6
Student Id Number
AGE
15 – 16
Age of student
GENDER
20
Gender of student (1 = male, 2 = female)
ETHNIC
22
Ethnicity of student ( 1 = African-American, 2 = Asian, 3 = Hispanic, 4 = White, 5 = others)
NFRIEND1
24
Number of close friends of student (Pretest), 1 = less than two, 2 = two to five, 3 = more than five.
TEACHID
40
Teacher ID.
TGENDER
42
Teacher gender (1 = male, 2= female)
TEXPER
44
Teacher experience (1 = old, 2=new)
TENTHUS
46
Teacher enthusiasm (1= enthusiastic, 2 = average enthusiastic, 3 = less than enthusiastic)
TINVOLV
48
Teacher involvement ( 1 = involved, 2 = not involved)
ZIP
49 – 53
Student’s zip code.
LIFE SKILLS DATA SET: Variable
Column No.
Description
DADED
56 – 57
Father’s education 1= did not finish 8th grade, 2 = did not finish high school, 3 = Graduated High School, 4 = attended college, but did not graduate 5 = Graduated from college, 6 = Master’s degree, PhD, MD or other advanced professional degree.
ESTEEM1
60 – 63
Self-esteem (pretest).
INTERN1
65 – 68
Internal Locus of Control (pretest)
POWERF1
70 – 73
Powerful others scale (pretest)
CHANCE1
75 – 78
Chance scale (pretest)
GOALSET1
80 – 83
Goal setting scale (pretest)
GOALGET1
85 – 88
Goal getting scale (pretest)
HABITS1
90-93
Habits scale (pretest)
PEER1
95 – 98
Attitude towards peer scale (pretest)
ADULTS1
100 – 103
Attitude towards adults scale (pretest)
ETHNICR1
105 – 108
Ethnic conflict scale (pretest)
BOYFRND1
110 – 113
Boyfriend/girlfriend conflict scale (pretest)
LIFE SKILLS DATA SET: Variable
Column No.
Description
RIVALGR1
115 – 118
Rival group conflict scale (pretest)
FRIENDS1
120 – 123
Conflict with friends scale (pretest)
SAFETY1
125 – 128
Attitude towards school safety scale (pretest)
PERCVTC1
130 – 133
Attitude towards teachers and other adults at school (pretest)
PERCVST1
135 – 138
Attitude towards students scale (pretest)
TREATP1
140 – 143
Attitude towards how students are treated at school (pretest)
FEELHS1
145 – 148
Attitude towards high school education (pretest).