Learning Costs
Hungry for Success? SNAP Timing, High-Stakes Exam Performance, and College Attendance
Timothy Bond et al.
NBER Working Paper, January 2021
Abstract:
Monthly government transfer programs create cycles of consumption that track the timing of benefit receipt. In this paper, we exploit state-level variation in the staggered timing of nutritional assistance benefit issuance across households to analyze how this monthly cyclicality in food availability affects academic achievement. Using individual-level score data from a large national college admissions exam in the United States linked to national college enrollment data, we find that taking this high-stakes exam in the last two weeks of the SNAP benefit cycle reduces test scores and lowers the probability of attending a 4-year college for low-income high school students.
Civic Education in High School and Voter Turnout in Adulthood
Aaron Weinschenk & Christopher Dawes
British Journal of Political Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
This article examines the effect of high school civic education on voter turnout in adulthood by integrating extensive academic transcript data on social studies and civic coursework into a large-scale, longitudinal survey of a nationally representative sample of adolescents. In an initial series of regression models, civics courses appear to have an effect on turnout in adulthood. However, after accounting for individual and family attributes, civic education has a fairly limited effect on turnout, though several measures have statistically significant effects even in the presence of controls. Interestingly, the study finds no support for the idea that high school courses that focus on service learning, civic skills development or political issues increase turnout in adulthood, which is contrary to expectations from the resource model of participation. After subjecting the civic effects that persist after accounting for controls to additional scrutiny by using family fixed-effects models that account for all observed and unobserved influences shared by siblings in the same family (for example, socialization, predispositions, etc.), the evidence suggests that there is a null relationship between civic education and turnout; the best-case scenario is that any civic education effects that do exist are likely very small. The idea that additional civics training will help to substantially elevate voter turnout appears to be overly optimistic.
Fear and Loathing in the Classroom: Why Does Teacher Quality Matter?
Mike Insler et al.
US Naval Academy Working Paper, January 2021
Abstract:
This work disentangles aspects of teacher quality that impact student learning and performance. We exploit detailed data from post-secondary education that links students from randomly assigned instructors in introductory-level courses to the students' performances in follow-on courses for a wide variety of subjects. For a range of first-semester courses, we have both an objective score (based on common exams graded by committee) and a subjective grade provided by the instructor. We find that instructors who help boost the common final exam scores of their students also boost their performance in the follow-on course. Instructors who tend to give out easier subjective grades however dramatically hurt subsequent student performance. Exploring a variety of mechanisms, we suggest that instructors harm students not by "teaching to the test," but rather by producing misleading signals regarding the difficulty of the subject and the "soft skills" needed for college success. This effect is stronger in non-STEM fields, among female students, and among extroverted students. Faculty that are well-liked by students - and thus likely prized by university administrators - and considered to be easy have particularly pernicious effects on subsequent student performance.
Students' Heterogeneous Preferences and the Uneven Spatial Distribution of Colleges
Chao Fu et al.
NBER Working Paper, January 2021
Abstract:
We estimate a model of high school students' college choices, allowing for rich heterogeneity in students' preferences for college attributes. We use data on students' enrollment decisions and application decisions - i.e., the sets of colleges to which they applied - to identify the distribution of students' preferences. We use our estimates to quantify differences in a student's expected value upon college application that result from the uneven spatial distribution of colleges. As with other aspects of economic opportunity, we find that place matters: students with otherwise identical characteristics can have very different expected values depending on where they live. The importance of location reflects differences across states as well as differences across counties within a state. For students with low parental incomes and low SAT scores, over 70% of the variation is within-state across counties, while for students with high parental incomes and high SAT scores, 66% of the variation is across states.
Is four less than five? Effects of four-day school weeks on student achievement in Oregon
Paul Thompson
Journal of Public Economics, January 2021
Abstract:
The achievement impacts of educational input quality have been well documented, but the quantity of exposure to the school environment - as measured by instructional time - also has profound impacts on students. This study examines the achievement impacts of a key instructional time reducing cost savings policy - the four-day school week. Using 3rd through 8th grade test scores from Oregon from 2005 to 2019 in a difference-in-differences analysis, I find that math test scores decrease by between 0.037 and 0.059 standard deviations and reading scores decrease by between 0.033 and 0.042 standard deviations following the switch to the four-day school week. It appears that reductions in time in school, which amount to three to four hours per week, largely drive these achievement declines. Using four-day school week adoption as an instrument for weekly time in school, I find that a one-hour increase in weekly time in school leads to a 0.018 standard deviation increase in math achievement and a 0.006 standard deviation increase in reading achievement. Finally, I compare the cost savings-achievement trade-off of the four-day school week with other traditional cost savings approaches and find that the four-day school week yields a comparable cost savings-achievement trade-off to many of these other interventions.
An Examination of Test Score Trajectories Around School Switching Due to Grade Configuration
Richard DiSalvo
Education Finance and Policy, forthcoming
Abstract:
Do grade configurations affect student academic performance? To bring new evidence to this question, I use recent district-by-grade data for nearly the entire United States which contain measures of test score achievement and rates of school switching induced by grade configuration. Past research has found that student performance is on average relatively low following switches due to grade configuration, but in fact students perform relatively better in the grades just prior to these switches. In the national data, I find that this so-called “top dog/bottom dog” pattern appears for all terminal grade choices among grades 3 through 8, is geographically widespread, and is robust to controlling for grade-specific effects of a rich set of covariates. Thus I establish that the top dog/bottom dog pattern is a very pervasive phenomenon in American education. I explore potential mechanisms and discuss policy and research implications.
Experimental Estimates of the Student Attendance Production Function
Long Tran & Seth Gershenson
Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, forthcoming
Abstract:
Student attendance is both a critical input and intermediate output of the education production function. However, the malleable classroom-level determinants of student attendance are poorly understood. We estimate the causal effect of class size, class composition, and observable teacher qualifications on student attendance by leveraging the random classroom assignments made by Tennessee’s Student/Teacher Achievement Ratio (STAR) Project class size experiment. A 10-student increase in class size increases the probability of being chronically absent by about 3 percentage points (21%). For Black students, random assignment to a Black teacher reduces the probability of chronic absence by 3.1 percentage points (26%). However, naive mediation analyses suggest that attendance is not a mechanism through which class size and same-race teachers improve student achievement.
The Impacts of Different Types of College Instructors on Students’ Academic and Labor Market Outcomes
Di Xu & Florence Xiaotao Ran
Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, Winter 2021, Pages 225-257
Abstract:
Based on a novel data set that links college administrative information with earnings records from a state college system for both public two‐year and four‐year colleges, this study quantifies the impacts of exposure to different types of instructors during students’ initial semester in college on their subsequent academic and labor market outcomes. To minimize bias from student sorting by type of instructor, we combine course‐set fixed effects with an instrumental variables approach that exploits term‐by‐term fluctuations in faculty composition in each department, therefore controlling for both between‐ and within‐course sorting. The findings suggest that two‐year students, particularly racial minority students, have substantially higher levels of exposure to adjuncts with temporary appointments than four‐year students. Two‐year students taking a heavy course schedule with temporary adjuncts are adversely affected in college persistence and subsequent credit accumulation, and the penalty is particularly pronounced among males and racial minority students with stronger academic potential. Such negative impacts on academic outcomes do not translate into poorer short‐ to medium‐term labor market performance. In the four‐year setting, no significant distinction is identified between different types of instructors on either student academic or labor market outcomes.
Ability Stratification Predicts the Size of the Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effect
Phil Parker et al.
Educational Researcher, forthcoming
Abstract:
Understanding how children’s broader context influences their development is critical if we are to develop policies that help them flourish. Combining sociological, economic, and psychological literature, we argue that ability stratification - the degree to which children of similar levels of ability are schooled together - influences a child’s academic self-concept. This is because countries with more ability stratification should have larger Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effects (the negative effect of school average achievement on academic self-concept). We used four cycles of the Trends in International Math and Science Study to test the hypothesis that more country-level ability stratification is associated with larger country-level Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effects for math self-concept. Findings strongly support this hypothesis. Our findings have implications for school system design and policy.
The Effects of Negative Equity on Children’s Educational Outcomes
Vicki Been et al.
NBER Working Paper, February 2021
Abstract:
This study examines the effects of negative equity on children’s academic performance, using data on children attending Florida public schools and housing transactions from the State of Florida. Our empirical strategy exploits variation over time in the timing of family moves to Florida in order to account for household sorting into neighborhoods and schools and selection into initial mortgage terms. In contrast to the existing literature on foreclosure and children’s outcomes, we find that Florida students with the highest risk of negative equity exhibit significantly higher test score growth. These effects are largest among Black students and students who qualify for free or reduced-priced lunch. We find evidence supporting two underlying mechanisms: (1) consumption patterns suggest that families in negative equity may reduce the impact of income losses on consumption by forgoing mortgage payments, and (2) mobility patterns suggest that families exposed to high levels of negative equity may move to schools that are of higher quality on average. While negative equity and foreclosure are undesirable, the changing incentives in terms of mortgage delinquency may have helped families manage the economic shocks caused by the great recession, as well as temporarily reduced the housing market barriers faced by low income households when attempting to access educational opportunities.
Still a Small World? University Course Enrollment Networks before and during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Kim Weeden, Benjamin Cornwell & Barum Park
Sociological Science, January 2021
Abstract:
In normal times, the network ties that connect students on a college campus are an asset; during a pandemic, they can become a liability. Using prepandemic data from Cornell University, Weeden and Cornwell (2020) showed how co-enrollment in classes creates a “small world” network with high clustering, short path lengths, and multiple independent pathways connecting students. Using data from the fall of 2020, we assess how the structure of the co-enrollment network changed as Cornell, like many other institutions of higher education, adapted to the pandemic by adopting a hybrid instructional model. We find that under hybrid instruction, not only is a much smaller share of students in the face-to-face network, but the paths connecting student pairs in the network lengthened, the share of student pairs connected by three or fewer degrees of separation declined, clustering increased, and a greater share of co-enrollment ties occurred between students in the same field of study. The small world became both less connected and more fragmented.
Mere plausibility enhances comprehension: The role of plausibility in comprehending an unfamiliar scientific debate
Johanna Abendroth & Tobias Richter
Journal of Educational Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Readers confronted with unfamiliar and controversial scientific debates tend to rely on simple heuristics such as the perceived plausibility to focus their cognitive resources on specific information during comprehension. In the present experiment, we tested the assumption that plausibility judgments as an integral part of comprehension are used as a simple heuristic to distribute cognitive resources to controversial texts, leading to a better comprehension of information judged as plausible. To experimentally vary perceived plausibility, participants (N = 54 university students) watched one of two video versions on the controversy of spider silk. The videos provided identical factual information but took opposing argumentative claims on the issue (pro vs. con). Afterward, participants read two conflicting texts (pro vs. con) on the same issue. Plausibility judgments and comprehension for the texts were assessed. In line with the hypothesized mediation model, results revealed that the belief manipulation (i.e., the video versions) affected the perceived plausibility of the controversial texts, which in turn influenced the comprehension of the two texts. The effect of the belief-manipulation, that is, participants’ better comprehension of the text that took the same argumentative stance as the video, was fully mediated by perceived plausibility. These results are relevant for educational interventions to improve the comprehension of controversial but unfamiliar scientific studies and for theories on the role of plausibility in (multiple) text comprehension.