Search Results
Working Paper
The Pathway to Enrolling in a High-Performance High School: Understanding Barriers to Access
In 2017, Chicago Public Schools adopted an online universal application system for all high schools with the hope of providing more equitable access to high-performance schools. Despite the new system, Black students and students living in low-socioeconomic status (SES) neighborhoods remained less likely than their peers to enroll in a high-performance high school. In this paper, we characterize various constraints that students and families may face in enrolling in a high-performance high school including eligibility to programs based on prior academic achievement, distance from ...
Working Paper
Technology’s edge: the educational benefits of computer-aided instruction
Because a significant portion of U.S. students lacks critical mathematic skills, schools across the country are investing heavily in computerized curriculums as a way to enhance education output, even though there is surprisingly little evidence that they actually improve student achievement. In this paper we present results from a randomized study in three urban school districts of a well- defined use of computers in schools: a popular instructional computer program which is designed to teach pre-algebra and algebra. We assess the impact of the program using statewide tests that cover a ...
Working Paper
Are Friends of Schools the Enemies of Equity? The Interplay of School Funding Policies and External Fundraising
School districts across the US have adopted funding policies designed to distribute resources more equitably across schools. Concurrently, schools are increasing external fundraising efforts to supplement district budget allocations. We document both funding policies and fundraising efforts in Chicago Public Schools. We find that adoption of a weighted-student funding policy reallocated more dollars to schools with high shares of students eligible for free/reduced-price lunch, creating a policy-induced per-pupil expenditure gap. Further, almost all schools raised external funds over the study ...
Impact of Student-Based Budgeting in Chicago Public Schools
Over the past 20 years, U.S. school districts have increasingly adopted funding models that aim to allocate money to schools based on individual student need. One such approach—weighted student funding—apportions funds to schools based on a combination of total enrollment and the characteristics of the students they serve. Chicago Public Schools (CPS) adopted such a funding model, known as student-based budgeting (SBB), beginning with the 2013–14 school year.
Journal Article
Child care costs and the return-to-work decisions of new mothers
Women's labor force participation has nearly doubled in the past 50 years. The increase has been even more dramatic for women with young children, and recent reforms to welfare programs are likely to push the participation rate for this segment even higher. This article examines the economic determinants of a woman's decision to return to work quickly following childbirth, looking in particular at sensitivity to child care costs.
Working Paper
Do returns to schooling differ by race and ethnicity?
Using data from the U.S. Decennial Census and the National Longitudinal Surveys, we find little evidence of differences in the return to schooling across racial and ethnic groups, even with attempts to control for ability and measurement error biases. While our point estimates are relatively similar across racial and ethnic groups, our conclusion is driven in part by relatively large standard errors. ; That said, we find no evidence that returns to schooling are lower for African Americans or Hispanics than for non-minorities. As a result, policies that increase education among the ...
Newsletter
The changing value of education
Why has the economic value of education stopped rising over the past ten years? The most likely explanation seems to be that the booming economy of the late 1990s helped to increase the average earnings of all workers, including those at the low end of the skills distribution.
Working Paper
An analysis of women's return-to-work decisions following first birth
Women's labor force participation rate has increased sharply over the last two decades. The increase has been particularly dramatic for married women with young children suggesting that women are spending less time out of the labor force for child-bearing and rearing. Using the relatively detailed information available in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, this paper explores women's decisions to return to work within one year of the birth of their first child, focusing particularly on the effect of child care costs. Consistent with economic theory, women who face lower child care ...
Working Paper
Using market valuation to assess the importance and efficiency of public school spending
In this paper we take a "market-based" approach to examine whether increased school expenditures are valued by potential residents and whether the current level of public school provision is inefficient. We do so by employing an instrumental variables strategy to estimate the effect of state education aid on residential property values. We find evidence that, on average, additional state aid is valued by potential residents and that school districts appear to spend efficiently or, if anything, underspend. We also find that school districts spend less efficiently in areas in which they face ...
Working Paper
Financial incentives and educational investment: the impact of performance-based scholarships on student time use
Using survey data from a field experiment in the U.S., we test whether and how financial incentives change student behavior. We find that providing post-secondary scholarships with incentives to meet performance, enrollment, and/or attendance benchmarks induced students to devote more time to educational activities and to increase the quality of effort toward, and engagement with, their studies; students also allocated less time to other activities such as work and leisure. While the incentives did not generate impacts after eligibility had ended, they also did not decrease students? inherent ...