Beyond “Fine”

The longer students spend in school, the less they like it. Middle and high school students are particularly dissatisfied with their school experiences compared to elementary school students.

While the quality of student experiences is generally consistent across race and class, it varies significantly depending on students’ ages. Students report relatively strong learning experiences in elementary school, but the quality of those experiences is lower for those attending middle and high school.

For example, 73% of students in Grade 3 report that they love school. However, this drops to 41% by Grade 6 and continues to decline, with only 29% reporting that they love school by Grade 11. This pattern also holds true for how much students feel like they’re learning: 86% of students in grade 3 report that they learn a lot in school, but by the time they reach high school, only a little more than half of students feel like they’re learning a lot in school.

This decline is also apparent in questions related to some of the Leaps that the science of learning and development suggest are most important for learning, such as relevance, rigor, and connection.

Our findings are mirrored in similar results from research conducted by others. In a 2016 study, Gallup found that the closer students get to graduating from high school and entering the world of work, the less enthusiastic they feel about school; while 74% of the youngest students in their study were engaged in school, that number dropped to only 32% by 11th grade. Similarly, research by Cognia across nearly 350,000 students found significant drops in behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement as students move from elementary to middle to high school.

One potential explanation for this trend can be found in the wide and growing body of research that demonstrates a mismatch between the antiquated designs of most middle and high schools and the needs of adolescents for independence, self-expression, and agency. In his book 10 to 25: The Science of Motivating Young People, acclaimed developmental psychologist David Yeager emphasizes the unique importance of respect, validation, and high expectations for adolescent development. When schools don’t meet that need—for example, by emphasizing compliance and rote memorization—the result is student disengagement and non-learning.

Unfortunately, too many American high schools are still designed to train assembly line workers for industrial factories: Students sit in desks and rows, working in isolation on rote tasks divorced from a larger sense of purpose or relevance. This type of learning environment was well suited to prepare students for the economy of the 1920s and 1930s when high-paying jobs required memory for details, facility with following directions, and the ability to work independently for long periods of time. However, it is mismatched with the economy of the 2020s and 2030s. As AI automates routine tasks, the most desirable jobs require complex problem-solving, critical thinking, and creativity—the uniquely human capacities AI can't (yet!) replicate. In a recent World Economic Forum report, over 50% of employers identified curiosity, lifelong learning, creative thinking, and empathy as core skills expected to increase in importance by 2030; almost 70% identified resilience, flexibility, and agility as essential—skills that the industrial design of school was never designed to create.

It may also be possible that this trend reflects the biological reality of child development, as evidenced by higher levels of depression and dissatisfaction that adolescents feel across all parts of their life; it may just be that adolescents are more broadly dissatisfied in general, regardless of their context. This alternate theory is partially undermined by examples of “positive outlier” learning environments where adolescents have significantly more positive learning experiences, but is worth consideration nonetheless.

Female students in grades 5-10 are particularly dissatisfied with their experiences related to relationships, affirmation, and emotional support compared to male students.

While the drop in the quality of self-reported school experiences as students age is consistent across all students, it is particularly pronounced for adolescent girls’ perception of the quality of their relationships, affirmation, and emotional support (i.e., the Connection & Community and Whole-Child Focus Leaps).* Interestingly, the disparity between girls and boys doesn’t appear for questions related to Relevance, High Expectations with Rigorous Learning, or other aspects of their schooling experience; it is a unique feature of the way girls vs. boys are experiencing the social and emotional aspects of school.

(*We conducted ANOVA statistical tests that confirmed that these differences were statistically significant with a high degree of confidence.)

Other studies, such as the CDC Risk Behavior Study, report similar trends, including that adolescent girls are more likely than boys to experience persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness—a rate that has increased significantly from 10 years ago. Research published in 2022 with over 200,000 responses to the YouthTruth survey, another prominent student experience survey, similarly reported that the quality of student experiences drops as students move from elementary to middle to high school, with larger declines for female than male students. The YouthTruth survey also indicated significantly lower quality experiences for non-binary students. (Our dataset did not include a sufficient quantity of non-binary students to be able to report disaggregated data for them.)

As with the trends related to lower satisfaction among adolescent students than younger students, there may be some broader trend unrelated to school that causes girls to be less satisfied than boys with their relationships across all contexts, such as the pervasive presence of social media and its potential negative effects on relationships and well-being. This alternative theory is somewhat undermined by the existence of “positive outlier” schools where girls and boys are both having consistently positive experiences (see finding 4). However, these may simply be schools that have more successfully addressed these broader social trends.

Interestingly, there is also a growing body of research on the particular struggles of boys and men in American society, including within schools. Questions about the relationships between gender, school, and thriving are obviously nuanced and complex, and we should avoid the risk of essentializing based on gender. However, we believe that these data are noteworthy and suggest the need for additional research.