ABSTRACT This paper refers to whole school interventions aiming to promote student learning outcomes through improving the functioning of school factors. Evaluation studies of these interventions mainly measure their impact on student learning outcomes. This paper argues for the importance of studying the mechanisms of whole school interventions through testing the theoretical framework upon which each intervention is based. We stress the importance of using Multilevel Structural Equation Model (MSEM) for identifying indirect effects of whole school interventions on student learning. To illustrate the strengths of this approach, we present an experimental study investigating the impact of the Dynamic Approach to School Improvement (DASI) on promoting student learning outcomes. The methods of this study and the use of mediation MSEM in a 2-2-1 design to test the main theoretical assumption of DASI are presented. The intervention was found to have both a direct (d = 0.21) and an indirect effect (d = 0.13) on student achievement in mathematics. Implications for designing and evaluating theory-driven school improvement approaches are drawn.

中文翻译：

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测试旨在促进学生学习成果的全校干预的理论框架：多层次结构方程建模的贡献

摘要本文涉及整个学校的干预措施，旨在通过改善学校因素的功能来促进学生的学习成果。这些干预措施的评估研究主要衡量其对学生学习成果的影响。本文认为，通过测试每种干预措施所基于的理论框架，研究整个学校干预措施的机制的重要性。我们强调使用多层结构方程模型（MSEM）来确定整个学校干预对学生学习的间接影响的重要性。为了说明这种方法的优势，我们提供了一项实验研究，研究了动态学校改进方法（DASI）对促进学生学习成果的影响。提出了这项研究的方法以及在2-2-1设计中使用中介MSEM来测试DASI的主要理论假设。研究发现，该干预措施对学生的数学成绩有直接影响（d = 0.21）和间接影响（d = 0.13）。提出了设计和评估理论驱动的学校改进方法的含义。