FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT:
Matthew M. Chingos mchingos@brookings.edu Brookings Institution
Paul E. Peterson ppeterso@gov.harvard.edu Harvard University
Antonio Wendland pepg_administrator@hks.harvard.edu 617-495-7976
What Works Clearinghouse Gives Voucher Study Highest Rating
Study Finds School Vouchers Boost College Enrollment for African Americans by 24%
CAMBRIDGE, MA— The What Works Clearinghouse (WWC), an initiative of the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences, announced today that “The Effects of School Vouchers on College Enrollment: Experimental Evidence from New York City” meets WWC standards without reservations.
The study, conducted by Matthew M. Chingos of the Brookings Institution and Paul E. Peterson, Director of Harvard’s Program on Education Policy and Governance, was singled out as a well-implemented randomized control trial.
The What Works Clearinghouse reviews individual studies and assesses the quality of the research design and technical details about the study’s design and findings. The full WWC evaluation of the study is available here.
“The Effects of School Vouchers on College Enrollment: Experimental Evidence from New York City” is the first-ever experimental study of college-enrollment outcomes of school voucher programs. It found that the percentage of African American students who enrolled part-time or full-time in college by 2011 was 24 percent higher for those who had won a school voucher lottery while in elementary school, and had used their voucher to attend a private school.
An analysis of the study, “The Impact of School Vouchers on College Enrollment,” will appear in the Summer issue of Education Next and is now available online.
About the Authors
Matthew M. Chingos is a fellow in the Brookings Institution’s Brown Center on Education Policy. Paul E. Peterson is the Henry Lee Shattuck Professor of Government and director of the Program on Education Policy and Governance at Harvard University and senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. The authors are available for interviews.
About Education Next
Education Next is a scholarly journal published by the Hoover Institution that is committed to careful examination of evidence relating to school reform. Other collaborating institutions are the Program on Education Policy and Governance at Harvard University, part of the Taubman Center for State and Local Government at the Harvard Kennedy School, and the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation. For more information about Education Next, please visit: www.educationnext.org
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For more information on the Program on Education Policy and Governance contact Antonio Wendland at 617-495-7976, pepg_administrator@hks.harvard.edu, or visit www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg
