A new set of four studies conducted by Pat Wolf and colleagues evaluate various aspects of the Louisiana Scholarship Program. The program, it’s important to note, prohibits participating schools from using their normal selective admissions process for their voucher kids and also mandates that they administer the state test, among other requirements.
The first study examines how the scholarships affect student achievement. It focuses on the 2012–13 applicant cohort, including those who took state tests in grades 3–6 in school year 2011–12. This provides student baseline scores for kids before entering the program. Students who applied to oversubscribed schools were randomly chosen to receive scholarships. The study found that the voucher program had a negative impact on participating students’ achievement in the first two years of operations, most clearly in math. Specifically, a voucher user who was performing at the fiftieth percentile at baseline fell twenty-four percentile points below their control group peers in math after one year. By year two, however, they were thirteen percentile points below, so at least they were on the upswing. (The results for reading impact can’t be presented with confidence.)
The second study measured the impact of the voucher programs on non-cognitive skills like self-control and conscientiousness. It found no differences between kids awarded scholarships and those who were not. Due to several reasons—unreliable measures and low response rates, among them—the scholars say that these results aren’t conclusive.
The third study examines how the program impacts racial isolation and finds that, overall, the program improves the integration of Louisiana schools. That’s because many black voucher-receiving students leave schools where they are overrepresented and enter private schools where they are underrepresented.
The final study attempts to measure the competitive pressures facing public schools as a result of the voucher program. In other words, how does the program affect students who remain in public schools? They admit that this is hard to measure and end up looking for a “consistent story” relative to things like the proximity of private schools in relation to public schools, their density, and how evenly distributed they are in their respective areas. They find neutral-to-positive impacts that are small in magnitude. Effects are largest (but still modest) for students attending those public schools with a private school competitor in close proximity.
To summarize, the program results in negative effects for voucher kids in math; no harm for kids in public schools; no impact on non-cognitive measures; and improvement in racial integration in the schools. That’s a mixed bag if there ever was one.
SOURCE: Jonathan N. Mills, Anna J. Egalite, and Patrick J. Wolf, "How Has the Louisiana Voucher System Affected Students?," Education Research Alliance for New Orleans (February 2016).
