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Do Parents Value School Effectiveness?

Author

Listed:
  • Atila Abdulkadiroglu
  • Parag A. Pathak
  • Jonathan Schellenberg
  • Christopher R. Walters
Abstract
School choice may lead to improvements in school productivity if parents’ choices reward effective schools and punish ineffective ones. This mechanism requires parents to choose schools based on causal effectiveness rather than peer characteristics. We study relationships among parent preferences, peer quality, and causal effects on outcomes for applicants to New York City’s centralized high school assignment mechanism. We use applicants’ rank-ordered choice lists to measure preferences and to construct selection-corrected estimates of treatment effects on test scores, high school graduation, college attendance, and college quality. Parents prefer schools that enroll high-achieving peers, and these schools generate larger improvements in short- and long-run student outcomes. Preferences are unrelated to school effectiveness and academic match quality after controlling for peer quality.

Suggested Citation

  • Atila Abdulkadiroglu & Parag A. Pathak & Jonathan Schellenberg & Christopher R. Walters, 2017. "Do Parents Value School Effectiveness?," NBER Working Papers 23912, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:23912
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    as
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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I24 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Inequality
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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