A Remarkable School-Choice Experiment

Jerusalem Demsas: “In 2012, Los Angeles Unified School District set up an experiment. It offered parents in some parts of the city a new option: Instead of automatically sending their middle schoolers to their neighborhood high school, parents could instead pick between a few high schools in their area. ~https://theatln.tc/hMPFbj8U~ 

“School choice is usually about providing parents an option outside the traditional public-school system. From 2010 to 2021, public charter-school enrollment in the U.S. more than doubled, even as states across the country have made it easier for parents to use public funding for homeschooling and private-school options.

“But Los Angeles did something different. It recognized the growing appetite for choice and wondered whether the normal public-school system could help satisfy it. The experiment was the sort ripe for an economics paper and, thankfully, someone took notice. Economist Christopher Campos’s paper reveals that when public high schools were forced to compete for enrollment, achievement gaps narrowed, and college enrollment took off.

“In today’s episode of Good on Paper, I talk with Campos about why students improved in this new system, and we grapple with tough questions about school segregation, the no-excuses model, and the role of principals in student outcomes.”

Listen here: ~https://theatln.tc/hMPFbj8U~

Submitted July 16, 2024 at 12:38PM by theatlantic https://ift.tt/5jyqL0K