November 8, 1999
Gibson receives $500,000 federal grant to continue research at Aptos High
By Jennifer McNulty
Margaret Gibson, a professor of education and anthropology, has received a federal
grant of nearly $500,000 to expand a research project at Aptos High School that is
exploring the role of peer influence in achievement among students of Mexican descent.
Gibson's latest infusion of support comes from the U.S. Department of Education/Office
of Educational Research and Improvement. The three-year grant for $495,489 will
enable her to follow her research subjects at Aptos High through their graduation
in 2002. It will also allow Gibson and her team of researchers to expand their scope
and conduct some comparative work at several other high schools beginning next year.
Gibson's study, which began last year, is looking closely at students' informal relationships
with each other, as well as with teachers and other school personnel, to learn how
peers affect students' identities and orientations toward schooling. The Spencer
Foundation provided a grant for $459,500 to support the initial project, which was
a two-year study based at Aptos High, where nearly half of the freshman class is
of Mexican descent. The National Science Foundation also provided a grant of about
$50,000 for the first year.
The project has implications for schools that are trying to find more effective ways
to meet the needs of all students, said Gibson, who is eager to identify positive
interventions that cut through the ambivalence, resistance, or sense of alienation
that can prevent students from being engaged.
Aptos High is recognized for its strong academic programs, yet student performance
reflects disturbing national and state patterns of disproportionately low academic
achievement among students of Mexican descent. In 1996, only 20 percent of Aptos
High seniors of Mexican descent who graduated had completed advanced math and science
classes, compared to 74 percent of white seniors.
