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EPI Working papers

Showing 31 - 60 of 61 results
EPI Working papers

Financial Aid Policy: Lessons from Research

May 1, 2013
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Susan Dynarski, Judith Scott-Clayton
In the nearly fifty years since the adoption of the Higher Education Act of 1965, financial aid programs have grown in scale, expanded in scope, and multiplied in form. As a result, financial aid has become the norm among college enrollees. Aid now...
EPI Working papers

New Evidence on Teacher Labor Supply

February 1, 2011
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Brian Jacob, Mimi Engel
Recent evidence on the large variance in teacher effectiveness has spurred renewed interest in teacher labor market policies. A substantial body of prior research documents that more highly qualified teachers tend to work in more advantaged schools,...
EPI Working papers

Manipulation in the Grading of New York's Regents Examinations

February 1, 2011
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Brian Jacob, Thomas Dee, Justin McCrary
The challenge of designing effective performance measurement and incentives is a general one in economic settings where behavior and outcomes are not easily observable. These issues are particularly prominent in education where, over the last two...
EPI Working papers

Do Principals Fire the Worst Teachers?

February 1, 2010
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Brian Jacob
This paper takes advantage of a unique policy change to examine how principals make decisions regarding teacher dismissal. In 2004, the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) signed a new collective bargaining agreement that...
EPI Working papers

Who Benefits from KIPP?

February 1, 2010
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Susan Dynarski, Joshua Angrist, Thomas Kane, Parag Pathak, Christopher Walters
Charter schools affiliated with the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP) are emblematic of the No Excuses approach to public education. These schools feature a long school day, an extended school year, selective teacher hiring, strict behavior norms...
EPI Working papers

Educational Expectations and Attainment

January 1, 2010
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Brian Jacob, Tamara Wilder
This paper examines the role of educational expectations in the educational attainment process. We utilize data from a variety of datasets to document and analyze the trends in educational expectations between the mid-1970s and the early 2000s. We...
EPI Working papers

The Impact of No Child Left Behind on Student Achievement

November 1, 2009
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Brian Jacob, Thomas Dee
The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act compelled states to design school-accountability systems based on annual student assessments. The effect of this Federal legislation on the distribution of student achievement is a highly controversial but...
EPI Working papers

Can You Recognize an Effective Teacher When You Recruit One?

November 1, 2008
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Brian Jacob, Jonah Rockoff, Thomas Kane, Douglas Staiger
Research on the relationship between teachers' characteristics and teacher effectiveness has been underway for over a century, yet little progress has been made in linking teacher quality with factors observable at the time of hire. However, most...
EPI Working papers

The Persistence of Teacher-Induced Learning Gains

June 1, 2008
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Brian Jacob, Lars Lefgren, David Sims
Educational interventions are often narrowly targeted and temporary, and evaluations often focus on the short-run impacts of the intervention. Insofar as the positive effects of educational interventions fadeout over time, however, such assessments...
EPI Working papers

Teacher Attitudes on Pay for Performance: A Pilot Study

October 1, 2007
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Brian Jacob, Matthew Springer
Researchers at the National Center on Performance Incentives recently examined teacher attitudes towards pay for performance policies in education, and how these views vary by teacher experience, subject area specialization, grade level taught,...
EPI Working papers

The Effect of Grade Retention on High School Completion

October 1, 2007
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Brian Jacob, Lars Lefgren
Low-achieving students in many school districts are retained in a grade in order to allow them to gain the academic or social skills that teachers believe are necessary to succeed academically. This practice is highly controversial, with many...