IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp18840.html

Unpacking Treatment Effect Heterogeneity in a Large-Scale Dropout-Prevention Experiment

Author

Listed:
  • Dee, Thomas

    (Stanford University)

  • Gibbs, Chloe

    (University of Notre Dame)

  • Margolit-Chan, Rebecca

    (Cornell University)

  • Morrell, Lillian

    (University of Notre Dame)

  • Sullivan, James

    (University of Notre Dame)

Abstract

Timely high school completion is a critical step in successful transitions to post-secondary schooling and the labor market. This randomized controlled trial, deployed in two urban, disadvantaged school districts, tests the effectiveness of a mature and comprehensive student-support program on an unusually large scale (n=2,528). While overall effects on graduation rates are small and statistically insignificant, exploratory analyses reveal notable variation by site and over time, mirroring heterogeneity in treatment timing and program implementation. These findings highlight the challenges of scaling interventions and raise concerns about generalizing results from small-scale, single-site evaluations.

Suggested Citation

  • Dee, Thomas & Gibbs, Chloe & Margolit-Chan, Rebecca & Morrell, Lillian & Sullivan, James, 2026. "Unpacking Treatment Effect Heterogeneity in a Large-Scale Dropout-Prevention Experiment," IZA Discussion Papers 18840, IZA Network @ LISER.
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18840
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp18840.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • I26 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Returns to Education
    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18840. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Mark Fallak (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaalu.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.