School Choice and Academic Achievement in Comparative Perspective

• In Event: Roundtable Session 4
  In Roundtable Session: Patterns and Consequences of School Choice

Abstract

In this paper we use PISA 2009 data from 64 countries and 476,831 students plus better measures of selection and socio-economic status to evaluate the effects of school choice, vouchers, and autonomy on student achievement. We use multilevel modeling and propensity score matching to estimate the effects of school choice, subsidized private schools, and principal autonomy on academic achievement. We find that after controls for opportunity to learn, student traits, teacher traits, school resources, and measured selection that school choice and public funding of private schools have a positive effect on achievement. However, school choice, public funding of private schools, and principal autonomy, have no effect on achievement once mean school socio-economic status is controlled.

Author

• Daniel A. Long, Wesleyan University