This paper uses a field experiment to answer how information frictions between parents and their children affect investments in education and how much reducing these frictions can improve student achievement. In Los Angeles, a random sample of parents was provided de-tailed information about...

This paper studies the impact of a desegregation ruling on several medium-run outcomes. This ruling mandates that seven school districts, which serve higher-income, predominantly-white families, accept a group of minority elementary school students who apply to transfer from a nearby,...

In many countries, important thresholds in examinations act as a gateway to higher levels of education and/or good employment prospects. This paper examines the consequences of just failing a key high stakes national examination in English taken at the end of compulsory schooling in England. It...

While leveraging parents has the potential to increase student performance, programs that do so are often costly to implement or they target younger children. We partner text-messaging technology with school information systems to automate the gathering and provision of information to parents at...

School assignment policies are a key lever to increase access to high performing schools and to promote racial and socioeconomic integration. For over 50 years, the Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO) has bussed students of color from Boston, Massachusetts to relatively...

Tracking is widespread in U.S. education. In post-secondary education alone, at least 71% of colleges use a test to track students. However, there are concerns that the most frequently used college placement exams lack validity and reliability, and unnecessarily place students from...

The Covid-19 pandemic drastically disrupted the functioning of U.S. public schools, potentially changing the relative appeal of alternatives such as homeschooling and private schools. Using longitudinal student-level administrative data from Michigan and nationally representative data from the...

Demand for personalized online tutoring in higher education is growing but there is little research on its effectiveness. We conducted an RCT offering remote peer tutoring in micro- and macroeconomics at a German university teaching online due to the Covid-pandemic. Treated students met in small...

We examine U.S. children whose parents won the lottery to trace out the effect of financial resources on college attendance. The analysis leverages federal tax and financial aid records and substantial variation in win size and timing. While per-dollar effects are modest, the relationship is...

We investigate how adolescents’ social status in their peers' eyes shapes the way they view their social climate in secondary schools. Utilizing novel data on over 10,000 students, we construct comprehensive measures of social status and perceived social climate for each student, including a...