In his New York Times column this week, the curmudgeonly Michael Winerip attempts to discredit the voucher movement by questioning Harvard scholar Paul Peterson's findings from a 2000 study of a New York City voucher experiment - a study that, according to Peterson's team, showed vouchers significantly improving achievement for black students. In support of his case, Winerip cites the results from a reanalysis of the same data by Princeton's Alan Krueger and Pei Zhu [for the Gadfly's review of this study, go to http://www.edexcellence.net/gadfly/issue.cfm?issue=18#215]. The latter employed different statistical methods and a different operational definition of "black" and found that the achievement gains dissipated. The jury remains out. America has not yet had the kind of voucher experiment it needs. And the opponents of vouchers, now undoubtedly scrambling to cite Winerip in support of their case, are determined that no such experiment ever takes place.
"What some much-noted data really showed about vouchers," by Michael Winerip, The New York Times, May 7, 2003