Working Papers
Our working papers promote dialogue about privatization in education. The papers are diverse in topic, including research reviews and original research, and are grounded in a range of disciplinary and methodological approaches. The views presented in the papers are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Center.
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The Center encourages submission of new research. Please email ncspe@columbia.edu with an abstract or draft submission.
Colombian Charter School Management, WP-234, 2017
Author(s): D. Brent Edwards Jr. and Stephanie M. Hall
In this study of charter school management of teachers and resources in Bogotá, D. Brent Edwards Jr. and Stephanie M. Hall build on research from a 2015 NCSPE working paper by Edwards and Hilary Hartley focused on the authorization and evaluation of charter schools in Colombia’s capital. Among the authors’ salient findings is that teachers in Bogotá’s charter schools must be more credentialed than their counterparts at traditional public schools yet they work longer hours, earn less money, and have no job security. For more on this working paper, see the NCSPE announcement.
Low-Fee Private Schools in India, WP-233, 2017
Author(s): Tamo Chattopadhay and Maya Roy
Across the developing world over the past two decades, low-fee private schools have opened their doors and generated controversy. Advocates argue that these schools fill a void created by state failure; deliver better education by making operators dependent on parental satisfaction; and catalyze government-run schools to improve through competition. Opponents contend such schools typically cannot accommodate children with learning disabilities; charge more than many poor families can afford, even though fees may seem nominal; and lack the accountability necessary to curb venal conduct. In “Low-Fee Private Schools in India: The Emerging Fault Lines,” Tamo Chattopadhay and Maya Roy illuminate this controversy by focusing on central challenges. For more about this working paper, see the NCSPE announcement.
School Choice in England, WP-232, 2016
Author(s): Helen F. Ladd and Edward B. Fiske
In “England Confronts the Limits of School Autonomy,” Helen F. Ladd and Edward B. Fiske provide a detailed analysis of the evolution of school choice in England and address the obstacles in the way of full implementation of Conservative Party ambitions as well as its likely drawbacks. The result is a rich depiction of dramatic change and a cautionary statement about the impact of full school independence on community input and student interests. For more about this working paper, see the NCSPE announcement.
Philanthropy, Geography, and Charter Schools, WP-231, 2016
Author(s): Joseph J. Ferrare and Renee Setari
How foundations coalesce and collaborate in particular parts of the country provides telling detail about education policy and its necessary conditions. In "Converging on Choice: The Inter-State Flow of Foundation Dollars to Charter School Organizations," Joseph J. Ferrare and Renee Setari examine this dynamic and in the process reveal unmistakable patterns of coordination and influence. For more about this working papers, see the NCSPE announcement.
Privatization, Choice, and Online Marketing, WP-230, 2016
Author(s): Sarah Butler Jessen and Catherine DiMartino
In “Perceptions of Prestige: A Comparative Analysis of School Online Media Marketing,” Sarah Butler Jessen and Catherine DiMartino provide a detailed assessment of the marketing tools increasingly employed by charter management organizations (CMOs) to win over philanthropists and politicians as well as parents. For more on this working paper, see the NCSPE announcement.
Vouchers Come to Louisiana, WP-227, 2015
Author(s): Amber Peterson
Vouchers have recently gained significant ground with the introduction of statewide programs in Indiana in 2011, Louisiana in 2012, and Nevada in 2015. In this paper, Amber Peterson provides a concise, balanced assessment of the state’s voucher program. Peterson explains the evolution of the program, eligibility requirements for both students and schools, distribution of participating private schools throughout the state, outreach efforts by the state, barriers to enrollment, and problems with school assessment. For more about this working paper, see the NCSPE announcement.
Theory versus Reality in Charter Schools in Colombia, WP-225, 2015
Author(s): D. Brent Edwards Jr. and Hilary Hartley
In 1999, Colombia joined many other countries in amplifying educational options by introducing charter schools. Called Concession Schools (Colegios en Concesión), they have been confined to the capital city, Bogotá, they grew in number by 2003 to 25 and remained at that count through 2014. In this paper, D. Brent Edwards and Hilary Hartley examine the process of authorization, evaluation, and enrollment to determine the degree of accountability and choice. For more about his working paper, see the NCSPE announcement.
Philanthropic Foundations as Institutional Entrepreneurs in the California Charter School Field, WP-221, 2014
Author(s): Rand Quinn, Megan Tompkins-Stange and Debra Meyerson
We discuss how a group of philanthropic foundations combined financial and cultural-political resources to elevate a new and divergent organizational form within the California charter school field. Foundations simultaneously pursued three activities that are often considered to be the realms of different types of institutional entrepreneurs. Foundations recombined cultural elements to establish a new organizational form, enforced evaluative frameworks to assess the new form, and sponsored new professionals to populate the form with desired expertise. We argue that foundations are a distinct type of institutional entrepreneur based on their simultaneous endowment of material and cultural-political resources.
- An updated version of this paper was published in the Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, Vol XX(X), 2013.Link to published study -
Effect of Constraints on Tiebout Competition: Evidence from the Michigan School Finance Reform, WP-212, 2012
Author(s): Rajashri Chakrabarti & Joydeep Roy
In 1994, Michigan enacted a comprehensive school finance reform that not only significantly increased state aid to low-spending districts, but also placed significant limits on local discretion over school spending. These limits especially constrained the high spending districts. This scenario affords us a unique opportunity to study the implications of such reforms on resource allocation, particularly as they differentially affected districts situated at different points of the pre-reform spending distribution. We find that the reform generally led to a negative effect on the growth of instructional expenditure and its share, as well as in teachers per pupil. But these declines were sharpest in the high spending districts. Interestingly, while trends for shares of administration expenditure as well as administrators per pupil also showed across the board declines, these declines were actually the smallest for the high spending districts. To the extent that instructional expenditures are more productive and contribute to student achievement more than administrative expenditures, these results suggest that loss of discretion acted as a disincentive for districts located throughout the spending distribution. Moreover, this disincentive effect was the strongest in the high spending districts. These findings have important policy implications and suggest that school finance reforms (or other policies) that place significant restraints on local discretion can lead to unintended disincentive effects, which should be taken into account while devising policy.
The Social Cost of Open Enrollment as a School Choice Policy, WP-190, 2010
Author(s): Cory Koedel, Julian R. Betts, Lorien A. Rice, & Andrew C. Zau
We evaluate the integrating and segregating effects of school choice in a large, urban school district. Our findings suggest that open enrollment, a school-choice program without explicit integrative objectives which does not provide busing, segregates students along three socioeconomic dimensions – race/ethnicity, student achievement and parental-education status. Using information on expenditures to promote integration at the district, we back out estimates of the social cost of open enrollment realized in terms of student segregation. Our estimates vary widely depending on several assumptions, but a social-cost estimate of roughly 10 million dollars per year is on the high end of our range of estimates for this single district. Although this number represents a sizeable portion of the district’s integrative-busing budget, it is a small fraction of the district’s total budget (≈1.4 billion dollars). Further, we note that this cost may be offset by benefits not related to integration.
The Start-up of Religious Charter Schools: Implications for Privatization and Choice in U.S. Education, WP-170, 2008
Author(s): Marcia J. Harr Bailey and Bruce S. Cooper
In recent years, the number and diversity of charter schools with religious themes and relationships have grown, focusing increased interest in several states on the cultural experiences of groups like the Muslims, Jews, Greek Orthodox, Hmong, and most recently Catholics. While these charter schools do not claim to be religious, the influence of their mission helps to provide a program and atmosphere that are culturally relevant to that religious group. Even though they have a particular religious identity, these charter schools do admit children and hire teachers from other faiths and cultures. Since these charter schools teach the values of religion -- but do not require prayer or Bible/Koran/Torah teaching -- they apparently do not as yet violate the 1st Amendment of the US Constitution -- and are therefore being publicly aided under various states’ charter legislation.
But the concept of a private, religiously-related school receiving public funding can be a delicate and controversial one, as these schools walk a fine legal line separating Church and State. This paper analyzes several case studies of new “religious” charter schools in an attempt to gain greater understanding of their development, as one of the newest forms of education privatization in the USA. Case studies of charter schools include the Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy, a Minnesota Muslim charter school; Hmong cultural charter schools; the Ben Gamla Hebrew Charter School in Hollywood, Florida, where modern Hebrew is a requirement; and the Hellenic Classical Charter School that teaches modern Greek, located in a Brooklyn, NY, Greek Orthodox parochial school. These comparative case studies reveal how schools with mainstream educational programs can also support the school's mission, curriculum, languages (e.g., modern Hebrew, Greek, and Arabic), and extra curricular activities that are all related to the schools’ particular culture and religion.
Is there a Difference Between For-Profit Versus Not-For-Profit Charter Schools?, WP-166, 2008
Author(s): Cynthia D. Hill and David M. Welsch
The role of for-profit educational organizations in the predominantly public and not-for-profit K-12 U.S. schooling system is being fiercely debated across our nation. Little empirical research is available to help policy makers develop informed decisions regarding the educational value that for-profit schools provide to our students. This paper fills in part, for the first time in detail, this void. This paper uses a four year panel of charter schools from the state of Michigan and a random effects model that controls for student and district characteristics. Results indicate that for-profit charter schools have lower math test scores than not-for-profit charter schools. Interestingly, this result holds even when expenditure per pupil is controlled for. The analysis developed in this paper takes the debate one step further as well, and examines the role that the size of for-profit firms plays in the associated outcomes.
An updated version of this paper is forthcoming in Education Economics