School accountability and school choice

1. School accountability and school choice Cassandra Hart, University of California-Davis David Figlio, Northwestern University & National Bureau of Economic Research Conference on Competition and Subnational Governments April 26, 2014

2. Motivation: Sorting between schools • Cream-skimming in school choice literature: concern that children of most-informed parents will use programs and leave public schools • School report cards under accountability programs meant to help parents make more informed choices • Relevant literatures on • parental use of information (Hastings, van Weelden, & Weinstein, 2007; Billings, Brunner, & Ross, 2014) • information on capitalization of information in housing markets (Figlio & Lucas, 2004) • But little work on how increased information (non-targeted) affects distribution of children across schools

3. Motivation: sorting between schools • Potential for provision of new information to either polarize or equalize composition of schools • Salience of grades—clear evaluation of quality from an authoritative source—may be especially high here • Might have greater effect on low-SES families, if they had less access to reliable gauges of quality previously • Might have greater effect on high-SES families, if they are better situated to act on new information

4. This paper • Look at how kindergarten class composition changes based on the provision of new information based on introduction of/changes to accountability regimes • A+ Accountability Plan roll-out (1999) • Differences in effects based on available alternatives • Effects on segregation indices

5. Florida A+ Accountability Plan • Introduced in Spring 1999 • Graded schools A-F • Replaced system in which parents primarily had access to information on raw test scores-provided “lumpy” evaluation of schools

6. Publicity around 1999 grades • Newspapers • FLDOE website

7. Front-page news in high-performing districts…

8. …and low-performing districts

9. Publicity around 1999 grades • Real estate agents • School spaces • DOE website

10. 1999 school average scores by 1999 grades

11. Data • Florida Education Data Warehouse individual student records (school enrollments, data on lunch status, etc.) • Birth records for birth cohorts from 1992 to 1999 • Detail on parental and family characteristics • Maternal education • Maternal age • Maternal marital status at birth • Birth conditions, (e.g. birth weight, multiple births, etc.)

12. Analytic plan • School-level information on changes in composition of incoming kindergarten classes • Maternal characteristics recorded during birth of child • Years of education • Age • Marital status (binary indicator for married) • Family income in kindergarten year (share FRL) • Index of all of these • Size of incoming kindergarten class

13. Analytic plan-1999 shock • 1999: new grade shock (for all grade levels separately). Equation for A grade: • Kst=school average characteristics of incoming kindergarten class (or log number students in some specifications) • Key IV: series of year indicators*1999Grade • τs: school fixed effect. SchoolVars includes excess absenteeism rate (share of students absent 21+ days), stability/mobility rate, suspension rates, and average FCAT test scores • Years 1997/98-2001/02 • Identify grade effect by controlling for underlying elements of school grade (Figlio & Lucas, 2004)

14. Composition: Mean maternal education *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

15. Composition: Mean maternal age *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

16. Composition: Fraction with married parents *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

17. Composition: Fraction on subsidized lunch *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

18. Index creation • Empirically driven • Regressed grade-year standardized FCAT score (average of math and reading) on: • Maternal education • Maternal age • Maternal marital status • Lunch status as of kindergarten • Race dummies (Black, White, Latino, Asian) • Maternal immigrant status • “Index” is the predicted third grade (standardized) test score based on these characteristics, fixed at birth or (for lunch status) K entry

19. Composition: Advantage index *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

20. Advantage index: First-borns only *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

21. Ln(enrollment) *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

22. Ln(enrollment): First-borns *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

23. Ln(enrollment): Effect of 1999 A *** p<.01, **, p<.05, *, p<.10,.

24. School grades and signaling • Does the effect of school grades depend on the performance/availability of neighboring schools • Availability=>can’t easily sort if nothing else easily available • Performance=>benchmarking/signaling story

29. Lee

31. Effects: by available alternatives • Measures of availability/quality of alternatives: • Any other public elementary within 3 miles (with 1999 grade) • Any other public elementary within 3 miles with 1999 grade C or lower • Had Public Choice grant (to support open enrollment plans) in 1999

32. Available alternatives: by grade Weighted by 1998 student populations

33. Index outcome: by alternatives

34. Segregation • IV: Within-city stddev of 1999 grades (standardized) • Outcome measures: Multigroup segregation index (Theil’s Information Index) • By race (White, Black, Latino, other) • By parental education (HS dropout, HS grad, some college, college grad) • By lunch status (not FRL/FRL)

36. Conclusion • Evidence of parental response to new provision of information (response to high-quality), especially among more educated parents • Modest evidence of benchmarking—response somewhat greater when alternatives judged poor quality (or too far to be easy alternatives) • Robust to district-by-district exclusion, exclusion of red-shirters and repeaters • Some evidence of segregative effects (by parental education levels only)

37. Thank you! Suggestions? cmdhart@ucdavis.edu, figlio@northwestern.edu