In this paper, we examine whether expanded access to sought-after schools can improve academic achievement. The setting we study is the "open enrollment" system in the Chicago Public Schools (CPS). We use lottery data to avoid the critical issue of non-random selection of students into schools. Our analysis sample includes nearly 450 lotteries for kindergarten and first grade slots at 32 popular schools in 2000 and 2001. We track students for up to five years and examine outcomes such as standardized test scores, grade retention and special education placement. Comparing lottery winners and losers, we find that lottery winners attend higher quality schools as measured by both the average achievement level of peers in the school as well as by value-added indicators of the school's contribution to student learning. Yet, we do not find that winning a lottery systematically confers any evident academic benefits. We explore several possible explanations for our findings, including the possibility that the typical student may be choosing schools for non-academic reasons (e.g., safety, proximity) and/or may experience benefits along dimensions we are unable to measure, but find little evidence in favor of such explanations. Moreover, we separately examine effects for a variety of demographic subgroups, and for students whose application behavior suggests a strong preference for academics, but again find no significant effects.
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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number
13443.
Length: Date of creation: Sep 2007 Date of revision: Publication status: published relationship to a non-chapter. This should not happen. Please contact NBER. Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13443
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Find related papers by JEL classification: H52 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Government Expenditures and Education I2 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
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Eric A. Hanushek & John F. Kain & Daniel M. O'Brien & Steven G. Rivkin, 2005.
"The Market for Teacher Quality,"
NBER Working Papers
11154, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
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