Milwaukee schools vouchers lottery 62 w

More recently, there have been a series of studies that exploit randomized voucher lotteries to estimate the effect of attending a private school. The Milwaukee

voucher program, offering vouchers to a limited number of low-income students to attend one of three private nonsectarian schools in the district, is the most prominent of these. Analyses of this program obtain sharply conflicting estimates of the impact on achievement depending upon the assumptions made to deal with selective attrition of lottery losers from the sample (Witte, Sterr et al. 1995; Green, Peterson et al. 1997; Witte 1997; Rouse 1998). Although in theory randomization provides an ideal context for the evaluation of school choice, in the Milwaukee case less than half of the unsuccessful applicants returned to the public schools and those who did return were from less educated, lower income families (Witte 1997)

The Effectiveness of School Choice: The Milwaukee Experiment. Cambridge, MA, Program on Education Policy and Governance, Harvard University.

al. 1995; Green, Peterson et al. 1997; Witte 1997; Rouse 1998).

Rouse, C. E. (1998). “Private School Vouchers and Student Achievement: An Evaluation of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 113(2): 553-602.

Rouse, C. E. (1998). “Private School Vouchers and Student Achievement: An Evaluation of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 113(2): 553-602.

from: THE EFFECT OF SCHOOL CHOICE ON STUDENT OUTCOMES:

EVIDENCE FROM RANDOMIZED LOTTERIES

Julie Berry Cullen

Brian A. Jacob

Steven Levitt

Working Paper 10113

http://www.nber.org/papers/w10113

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