Emily K. Penner

Aiming High and Falling Short: California's Eighth-Grade Algebra-for-All Effort

The United States is in the midst of an effort to intensify middle school mathematics curricula by enrolling more 8th graders in Algebra. California is at the forefront of this effort, and in 2008, the state moved to make Algebra the accountability benchmark test for 8th-grade mathematics. This article takes advantage of this unevenly implemented policy to understand the effects of curricular intensification in middle school mathematics. Using district-level panel data from all California K–12 public school districts, we estimate the effects of increasing 8th-grade Algebra enrollment rates on a 10th-grade mathematics achievement measure. We find that enrolling more students in advanced courses has negative average effects on students’ achievement, driven by negative effects in large districts.

Distributional Analysis in Educational Evaluation: A Case Study from the New York City Voucher Program

We use quantile treatment effects estimation to examine the consequences of the random-assignment New York City School Choice Scholarship Program across the distribution of student achievement. Our analyses suggest that the program had negligible and statistically insignificant effects across the skill distribution. In addition to contributing to the literature on school choice, the article illustrates several ways in which distributional effects estimation can enrich educational research: First, we demonstrate that moving beyond a focus on mean effects estimation makes it possible to generate and test new hypotheses about the heterogeneity of educational treatment effects that speak to the justification for many interventions. Second, we demonstrate that distributional effects can uncover issues even with well-studied data sets by forcing analysts to view their data in new ways. Finally, such estimates highlight where in the overall national achievement distribution test scores of children exposed to particular interventions lie; this is important for exploring the external validity of the interventions effects.

Categorical Inequality: Schools As Sorting Machines

Despite their egalitarian ethos, schools are social sorting machines, creating categories that serve as the foundation of later life inequalities. In this review, we apply the theory of categorical inequality to education, focusing particularly on contemporary American schools. We discuss the range of categories that schools create, adopt, and reinforce, as well as the mechanisms through which these categories contribute to production of inequalities within schools and beyond. We argue that this categorical inequality frame helps to resolve a fundamental tension in the sociology of education and inequality, shedding light on how schools can-at once-be egalitarian institutions and agents of inequality. By applying the notion of categorical inequality to schools, we provide a set of conceptual tools that can help researchers understand, measure, and evaluate the ways in which schools structure social inequality.

Teaching for All? Teach For America's Effects Across the Distribution of Student Achievement

ABSTRACT This article examines the effect of Teach For America (TFA) on the distribution of student achievement in elementary school. It extends previous research by estimating quantile treatment effects (QTE) to examine how student achievement in TFA and non-TFA classrooms differs across the broader distribution of student achievement. It also updates prior distributional work on TFA by correcting for previously unidentified missing data and estimating unconditional rather than conditional QTE. Consistent with previous findings, results reveal a positive impact of TFA teachers across the distribution of math achievement. In reading, however, relative to veteran non-TFA teachers, students at the bottom of the reading distribution score worse in TFA classrooms, and students in the upper half of the distribution perform better.

Resource- and Approach-Driven Multidimensional Change: Three-Year Effects of School Improvement Grants:

Hoping to spur dramatic school turnaround, the federal government channeled resources to the country’s lowest-performing schools through School Improvement Grants (SIG). However, prior research on SIG effectiveness is limited and focuses primarily on student achievement. This study uses a difference-in-differences strategy to estimate program impacts on multiple dimensions across the 3-year duration of the SIG award in one urban school district. Following 2 years of modest improvement, we find pronounced, positive effects of SIG interventions on student achievement in Year 3, consistent with prior literature indicating that improvements from comprehensive school turnarounds emerge gradually. We also identify improvements indicating the process through which change occurred, including reduced unexcused absences, increased family preference for SIG schools, improved retention of effective teachers, and greater development of teacher professional capacity.

Early parenting and the reduction of educational inequality in childhood and adolescence

ABSTRACT Socioeconomic status (SES) differences in parenting are often implicated in widening the SES-achievement gap. Using nationally representative data (N = 12,887), the author tested for variation across SES in the types and intensity of parenting behaviors utilized and then examined SES differences in the relationship between parenting and student achievement growth from kindergarten to Grade 8. Exploratory factor analysis identifies three dimensions of early parenting: Educational engagement, stimulating parent–child interaction, and discursive discipline. Regression results indicate that all three are used most heavily by high-SES families. However, only educational engagement consistently predicts achievement growth. Surprisingly, it is positively associated with achievement for lower-, but not higher-SES students in Grades 1–8. Further, educational engagement is beneficial for low-SES children because it is particularly beneficial for low-achieving students, consistent with a compensatory hypothesis.

Is Free and Reduced-Price Lunch a Valid Measure of Educational Disadvantage?:

Students in the United States whose household income is less than 130% of the poverty line qualify for free lunch, and students whose household income is between 130% and 185% of the poverty line qualify for reduced-price lunch. Education researchers and policymakers often use free and reduced-price lunch (FRPL) status to measure socioeconomic disadvantage. But how valid is this measure? Linking IRS income tax data to school administrative records for all eighth graders in one California public school district and Oregon public schools, we examine how well FRPL enrollment captures student disadvantage. We find that FRPL categories capture relatively little variation in household income. However, FRPL captures elements of educational disadvantage that IRS-reported household income data do not.

Education Policy and Conflict in Latin America: Lessons from Chile and Venezuela

Education policy can have a profound impact on political stability, revolution, and violent change, and thus plays an important role in creating or preventing conflict (Roberts-Schweitzer, Greaney, and Duer 2006, 2). Education can facilitate violent conflict by reinforcing confrontational political ideologies or training those who will become fighters (Leach and Dunne 2007, 23); likewise, the failure of an education system to provide a comprehensive education for students and support for educators can create fertile ground for protests and riots (Spencer and United States National Student Association 1965, 57). Alternatively, education can be used as a powerful tool for ameliorating hostility and restoring peace (Davies 2004, 8). The creation of new education policies can serve as a uniting force that works to heal tensions and rebuild nations after conflicts (Tawil and Harley 2004, 7). While instances of education instigating and curtailing conflict have been documented in numerous circumstances, the specific ways in which education policies create conflict or foster peace are not well understood. Research identifying education strategies that have ignited or extinguished political tensions and national conflicts is particularly limited. This chapter seeks to remedy this shortcoming by identifying specific education-policy strategies and policy contexts that either led to conflict or helped to prevent and end conflict.