The National Center on School Choice is funded by the United States Department of Education's Institute of Education Sciences. The Center exercises national leadership in school choice research, including charter and magnet schools, private school vouchers, teacher recruitment, school management, and state policymaking.

Longitudinal Data Analysis on the Main Effects
of School Choice

Dale Ballou, Vanderbilt University
Mark Berends, Vanderbilt University
Ron Houser, Northwest Evaluation Association

What are the main effects of school choice? In this project we are comparing the achievement growth of students in schools of choice—charter, magnet, Catholic, other religious, homeschooling—to students in traditional public schools. We are looking at issues such as how state education laws affect choice patterns and achievement.  And we are examining the No Child Left Behind student transfer option and its effects on achievement and achievement tradeoffs.  That is, we are seeking to learn whether particular groups of students, such as those on the bubble of proficiency, receive resources that other groups do not receive.  The various sets of studies in this project rely on quasi-experimental designs that use the Northwest Evaluation Association’s Growth Research Database (GRD) longitudinal data between the 2002-03 school years to the present.