Search Results
Report
Impact of voucher design on public school performance: evidence from Florida and Milwaukee voucher programs
This paper examines the impact of vouchers in general and voucher design in particular on public school performance. It argues that all voucher programs are not created equal. There are often fundamental differences in voucher designs that affect public school incentives differently and induce different responses from them. It analyzes two voucher programs in the United States. The 1990 Milwaukee experiment can be looked upon as a "voucher shock" program that suddenly made low-income students eligible for vouchers. The 1999 Florida program can be looked upon as a "threat of voucher" program, ...
Report
Vouchers, public school response, and the role of incentives: evidence from Florida
In this paper, I analyze the behavior of public schools facing vouchers. The literature on the effects of voucher programs on public schools typically focuses on student and mean school scores. This paper tries to go inside the black box to investigate some of the ways in which schools facing the threat of vouchers in Florida behaved. Under a 1999 program, Florida schools earning an "F" grade for the first time were exposed to the threat of vouchers, but did not face vouchers unless and until they got a second "F" within the next three years. Exploiting the institutional details of this ...
Journal Article
New Jersey’s Abbott districts: education finances during the Great Recession
Funding for New Jersey?s low-income school districts tumbled in the most recent recession, and the Abbott districts?a group of poor urban districts that for almost two decades received special appropriations from the state?were hit especially hard. A comparison with the state?s other low-income districts reveals that the Abbott districts faced markedly sharper declines in aid, relative to trend. Consequently, while all of the low-income districts responded to the drop in state aid by scaling back spending on support services and utilities, only the Abbott group also made significant cuts in ...
Speech
Impact of the Great Recession on public schools in the region
Remarks at the Quarterly Regional Economic Press Briefing, New York City.
Report
Do charter schools crowd out private school enrollment? Evidence from Michigan
Charter schools have been one of the most important dimensions of recent school reform measures in the United States. Currently, there are more than 4,500 charter schools spread across forty U.S. states and the District of Columbia. Though there have been numerous studies on the effects of charter schools, these have mostly been confined to analyzing the effects on student achievement, student demographic composition, parental satisfaction, and the competitive effects on regular public schools. This study departs from the existing literature by investigating the effect of charter schools on ...
Working Paper
Charter school tax credit: Investing in human capital
This working paper considers how two existing policy tools--investment tax credits and charter schools--could be combined to raise operating funds for charter schools that successfully close the poverty-related academic achievement gap. Some charter schools have succeeded in dramatically improving low-income student performance (those run by KIPP, Achievement First, and the Harlem Children's Zone, for example). However, these successful schools differ significantly in type and approach. As a result, it is difficult to identify a single, or combination of variables in any one charter that, if ...
Journal Article
Connecting public schools to community development
In neighborhoods across the country, public schools and community groups are beginning to work together in new and innovative ways. Connie Chung explores the wide variety of roles that public schools can play in community development efforts.
Journal Article
Unintended consequences of school accountability policies: evidence from Florida and implications for New York
Over the past two decades, state and federal education policies have tried to hold schools more accountable for educating students by tying rewards and sanctions to test scores and other measurable outcomes. A common criticism of these policies is that they may induce schools to ?game the system? along with?or instead of?making genuine educational improvements. One such strategic response may be to classify low-performing students into categories that are excluded from grade computation in an effort to artificially inflate scores. This article analyzes school responses to an influential ...
Journal Article
Program design, incentives, and response: evidence from educational interventions
In an effort to reform K-12 education, policymakers have introduced school vouchers?scholarships that make students eligible to transfer from public to private schools?in some U.S. school districts. This article analyzes two such educational interventions in the United States: the Milwaukee and Florida voucher programs. Under the Milwaukee program, vouchers were imposed from the outset, so that all low-income public school students became eligible for vouchers to transfer to private schools. In contrast, schools in the Florida program were only threatened with vouchers, with students of a ...
Speech
The national and regional economy
Remarks at Pace University, New York City.