Race and the Mismeasure of School Quality

Joshua Angrist, Peter Hull, Parag Pathak and Christopher Walters

No 29608, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: In large urban districts, schools enrolling more white students tend to have higher performance ratings. We use an instrumental variables strategy leveraging centralized school assignment to explore this relationship. Estimates from Denver and New York City suggest the correlation between school performance ratings and white enrollment shares reflects selection bias rather than causal school value-added. In fact, value-added in these two cities is essentially unrelated to white enrollment shares. A simple regression adjustment is shown to yield school ratings that are uncorrelated with race, while predicting value-added as well or better than the corresponding unadjusted measures.

JEL-codes: I21 I24 I26 I28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-12
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Published as Joshua Angrist & Peter Hull & Parag A. Pathak & Christopher R. Walters, 2024. "Race and the Mismeasure of School Quality," American Economic Review: Insights, vol 6(1), pages 20-37.

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Journal Article: Race and the Mismeasure of School Quality (2024)
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