August 19, 2019
As American students head back to school, how can we ensure that all children — regardless of their socioeconomic background — have an equal opportunity to succeed in life?
New academic research about the long-term effects of very different schooling models in Connecticut and Milwaukee suggests that letting parents and students choose their schools is part of the answer.
In Connecticut, 8th graders across the state have the chance to apply to technical high schools that provide instruction aimed to prepare students for careers. Students are offered admission based on their 8th-grade standardized test scores and attendance rates. Freshmen spend their first year exploring different technical fields, allowing students to choose an area of specialization for 10th through 12th grades. Graduates earn a certificate in their technical area along with their diploma and are expected to pursue an apprenticeship or to enroll in college. Approximately 7 percent of the state’s students enroll in these schools.
New research indicates that this is an effective model for preparing students for the workforce. University of Connecticut researchers Eric Brunner, Shaun Dougherty, and Stephen Ross analyzed the outcomes of the students who applied Connecticut’s technical schools from 2006 to 2013.
The researchers found that male students attending Connecticut’s technical high schools were more likely to graduate high school and less likely to attend college. But they had significantly higher earnings following high school than their peers who did not attend the technical schools. The researchers found that “total earnings increase by 37% percent relative to a sample average of $63,000,” based on income data from 1.5 to 8.5 years following high school.
The researchers provide a detailed explanation of how they reached their findings here. They explain that the positive effects appear to be broad for male students, in that the benefits were apparent across different student background characteristics. Interestingly, they did not find any positive effects for female students.
In Milwaukee, children from families with earnings below 300 percent of the poverty line can use scholarships to attend private schools through the city’s longstanding Parental Choice Program. Nearly 29,000 students attended private schools using this option during the 2018–19 school year, according to EdChoice.
Researchers Patrick J. Wolf and John F. Witte from the University of Arkansas and Brian Kisida from the University of Missouri recently presented an analysis of attainment levels of Milwaukee choice students compared to a “matched” sample of peers in the school district, based on data from 2006 to 2018. The authors report higher levels of attainment for students in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program:
“The collective evidence in this paper indicates that students in the MPCP program have greater educational attainment than the comparison group, as measured by college experience and outcomes. Most of the college attainment benefits of the MPCP are clear for both students who were in ninth grade at the beginning of the study, for whom positive attainment effects have previously been reported, and students who were initially enrolled in grades three through eight, who we examine here for the first time.”
The researchers offered important context for their findings by pointing out that the overall college attainment rates for the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program students and their peers were very low. “The highest estimated rate of four-year graduation for any student subgroup is 15 percent.” The authors explain, “this low completion rate is symptomatic of many inner-city high school graduates who go on to college.”
Nevertheless, the evidence from both the Connecticut and Milwaukee programs highlight the potential long-term benefits from allowing students to attend a chosen school — including both technical schools preparing students for careers or a private school preparing students for college.
Prior academic evaluations of career and technical education (CTE) and private school choice programs have been shown to deliver similar long-term benefits, though the evidence is limited. (The Brookings Institution summarized the available gold-standard research evidence on CTE as of 2017 here. The Urban Institute analyzed the findings of long-term outcomes of private school choice programs as of July 2019 here, which showed benefits in Florida and Milwaukee, but no impact in Washington, DC).
In terms of value, both of these choice programs in Connecticut and Milwaukee operate at a discount for taxpayers.
Connecticut spends about $17,300 per student at its technical high schools, according to the Connecticut School Finance Project. In comparison, Connecticut’s traditional public schools spend about $21,500 per-student on average, according to federal data.
The Milwaukee choice program costs between $7,700 and $8,400 per-student (depending on grade level), compared to about $12,700 per student in Milwaukee’s public schools, according to the U.S. Department of Education.
So, both programs improve participating children’s long-term outcomes, while costing less for the government.
These promising findings are important and helpful to all of us who think about public policy. But the research only corroborates what these parents and students already decided — attending these schools is in their best interest and will pay off over the long-term. Shouldn’t more students have the same opportunity to make that decision?
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