Education Freedom and Student Achievement: Is More School Choice Associated with Higher State-Level Performance on the NAEP?

Autor/inn/en	Wolf, Patrick J.; Greene, Jay P.; Ladner, Matthew; Paul, James D.
Institution	University of Arkansas, School Choice Demonstration Project (SCDP)
Titel	Education Freedom and Student Achievement: Is More School Choice Associated with Higher State-Level Performance on the NAEP?
Quelle	(2021), (38 Seiten) PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Monographie
Schlagwörter	School Choice; National Competency Tests; Academic Achievement; Private Schools; Charter Schools; Home Schooling; Achievement Gains; Elementary Secondary Education; Grade 4; Grade 8; Access to Education; United States; Arizona; Ohio; Florida; National Assessment of Educational Progress + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Choice of school; Schulwahl; Schulleistung; Private school; Privatschule; Charter school; Charter-Schule; Homeschooling; Home instruction; ; Hausunterricht; Heimschule; Achievement gain; Leistungssteigerung; School year 04; 4. Schuljahr; Schuljahr 04; School year 08; 8. Schuljahr; Schuljahr 08; Education; Access; Bildung; Zugang; Bildungszugang; USA
Abstract	Since the start of the new millennium, many states have launched or expanded private school choice options, permitted and expanded independently operated public charter schools, eased restrictions on homeschooling, and enacted policies that allow and encourage various forms of public school choice. One thing that is not on the rise, unfortunately, is average student scores on the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP). Student performance on the assessments, typically called "The Nation's Report Card," were flat from 2001 until 2015 and have dropped slightly in both 2017 and 2019. While it is impossible to determine the causal effect on student achievement of all the deliberate decisions of state policymakers to expand or restrict the various forms of school choice, it is possible to describe the extent to which more educational freedom does or does not correlate with state-level changes in student academic performance. In this study the authors construct a comprehensive index of educational freedom that measures the availability and accessibility of private, charter, homeschool, and public school choice across the 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia (DC). It is called the 2021 Education Freedom Index (EFI), as it is modeled after a similar measure of comparative educational freedom introduced in 2000. The authors present the rankings of the 50 states plus DC on each of the four major components of the 2021 EFI, individually, as well as their rankings on the complete index. Findings show that higher levels of education freedom are significantly associated with higher NAEP achievement levels and higher NAEP achievement gains in all statistical models. This descriptive analysis supports the idea that expanding parental options in education, in all its forms, is consistent with improvements in average student performance for U.S. states. [Funding for this report was provided by the American Federation for Children.] (ERIC).
Anmerkungen	School Choice Demonstration Project. Department of Education Reform, University of Arkansas, 201 Graduate Education Building, Fayetteville, AR 72701. Tel: 479-575-3172; Fax: 479-575-3196; e-mail: edreform@uark.edu; Web site: https://scdp.uark.edu/
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2024/1/01