This paper examines the effects of policies that increase the number of students who take the first course in algebra in 8th grade, rather than waiting until 9th grade. Extending previous research that focused on the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school system, we use data for the 10 largest districts in North Carolina.
Community colleges are complex organizations and assessing their performance, though important, is difficult. Compared to four-year colleges and universities, community colleges serve a more diverse population and provide a wider variety of educational programs that include continuing education and technical training for adults, and diplomas, associates degrees, and transfer credits for recent high school graduates.
In 2002/03, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools initiated a broad program of accelerating entry into algebra coursework. The proportion of moderately-performing students taking 8th grade algebra increased from less than half to nearly 90%, then reverted to baseline levels, in the span of just six age cohorts. We use this policy-induced variation to infer the impact of accelerated entry into algebra on student performance in math courses as students progress through high school.
Does differential access to computer technology at home compound the educational disparities between the rich and the poor? Would a program of government provision of computers to early secondary school students reduce these disparities? This study covers years 2000 to 2005, a period when home computers and high-speed Internet access expanded dramatically.
Research has consistently shown that teacher quality is distributed very unevenly among schools to the clear disadvantage of minority students and those from low-income families. Using information on teaching spells in North Carolina, the authors examine the potential for using salary differentials to overcome this pattern. They conclude that salary differentials are a far less effective tool for retaining teachers with strong pre-service qualifications than for retaining other teachers in schools with high proportions of minority students.
The gold standard in making causal inference on program effects is a randomized trial. Most randomization designs in education randomize classrooms or schools rather than individual students. Such "clustered randomization" designs have one principal drawback: They tend to have limited statistical power or precision. This study aims to provide empirical information needed to design adequately powered studies that randomize schools using data from Florida and North Carolina.
This study uses data from North Carolina to examine the extent to which survey based perceptions of working conditions are predictive of policy-relevant outcomes, independent of other school characteristics such as the demographic mix of the school's students. Working conditions emerge as highly predictive of teachers' stated intentions to remain in or leave their schools, with leadership emerging as the most salient dimension.
Do charter schools draw good teachers from traditional, mainstream public schools? Using an eleven-year panel of North Carolina public school teachers, the author finds nuanced patterns of teacher quality flowing into charter schools. High rates of inexperienced and unlicensed teachers moved to charter schools, but among regularly licensed teachers changing schools, charter movers had higher licensure test scores than other moving teachers, and they were more likely to be highly experienced.
Using detailed data from North Carolina, this paper examines the frequency, incidence, and consequences of teacher absences in public schools, as well as the impact of a policy designed to reduce absences.
No Child Left Behind judges the effectiveness of schools based on their students' achievement status. However, many policy analysts argue that schools should be measured, instead, by their students' achievement growth. Using a ten-year student-level panel dataset from North Carolina, we examine how school-specific pressure related to two school accountability approaches (status and growth) affects student achievement at different points in the prior-year achievement distribution.