Sustainability and Maturation of School Turnaround - A Multiyear Evaluation of Tennessee’s Achievement School District and Local Innovation Zones

Oct 15, 2026

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Study examines the long-term sustainability and maturation of two Tennessee school turnaround models: the state-led Achievement School District (ASD) and district-led local Innovation Zones (iZones). Using difference-in-differences models, results show overall positive student achievement effects in iZone schools and null effects in ASD schools. Findings also link reform effectiveness to staff turnover, with particularly high turnover patterns in ASD cohorts and in the latest iZone cohort.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages27

Reading Time1 h 8 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Study approach and research focus

Models and setting

Achievement School District (ASD)

Local Innovation Zones (iZones)

Methods and identification strategy

Difference-in-differences comparisons

AERA Open April-June 2020, Vol. 6, No. 2, pp. 1–27 DOI: 10. 1177/2332858420922841 Article reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)© The Author(s) 2020. [http://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero](http://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero) Sustainability and Maturation of School Turnaround: A Multiyear Evaluation of Tennessee’s Achievement School District and Local Innovation Zones Lam D. Pham Vanderbilt University Gary T. Henry University of Delaware Adam Kho University of Southern California Ron Zimmer University of Kentucky Recent evaluations of reforms to improve low-performing schools have almost exclusively focused on shorter term effects. In this study, we extend the literature by examining the sustainability and maturation of two turnaround models in Tennessee: the state-led Achievement School District (ASD) and district-led local Innovation Zones (iZones). Using difference-in-differences models, we find overall positive effects on student achievement in iZone schools and null effects in ASD schools. Additional findings suggest a linkage between staff turnover and the effectiveness of reforms. ASD schools experienced high staff turnover in every cohort, and iZone schools faced high turnover in its latest cohort, the only one with negative effects. We discuss how differences in the ASD and iZone interventions may help explain variation in the schools’ ability to recruit and retain effective teachers and principals. Keywords: school turnaround, school reform, teacher and principal turnover, teacher and principal effectiveness, long-term effects, difference-in-differences Federal policymakers have invested substantial resources into turning around persistently low-performing schools, with the expectation that interventions would swiftly improve student achievement within 3 years (Herman et al., 2008) . However, research evaluating school turnaround reports mixed results (Dee, 2012; Dragoset et al., 2017; Zimmer et al., 2017) . Since most of the existing research evaluates turnaround in the first few years of reform, results may be mixed because some reforms have immediate effects while others need longer to take hold. Longer term reforms align with the literature on earlier comprehensive school reform models, which find that school improvement efforts need more than 3 years to produce positive results (Aladjemet al., 2010; Berends et al., 2002; Bloom et al., 2001; Borman et al., 2003; Gross et al., 2009; Stuit, 2010) .1 Moreover, even if reforms do produce positive results early on, little is known about the sustainability of turnaround reforms. This article fills these gaps in the literature by examining both schools that have implemented turnaround reforms for multiple years and later cohorts that begin reforms after the turnaround models have matured. Evidence from more mature turnaround initiatives is especially important under the current Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). Under ESSA, more states are designing reforms that will operate for longer. For example, North Carolina’s ESSA plan gives its lowest-performing schools up to 12 years of school improvement supports (North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, 2018) . In this article, we inform the sustainability of longer term ESSA reform models using updated data from 6 years of reform in Tennessee. These data allow us to contribute new evidence from one of the few turnaround initiatives across the country Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License ([https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages ([https:

FAQs

What are the two school turnaround models evaluated in the study?

The study evaluates the state-led Achievement School District (ASD) and district-led local Innovation Zones (iZones) in Tennessee.

What does the study find about student achievement outcomes?

iZone schools show overall positive effects on student achievement, while ASD schools show null effects.

How does staff turnover relate to reform effectiveness?

The study reports a linkage between staff turnover and reform effectiveness, noting high turnover in every ASD cohort and in the latest iZone cohort, which is the only iZone cohort with negative effects.

Oct 15, 2026

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