Transitional Kindergarten (TK) is a relatively recent entrant into the U.S. early education landscape, combining features of public pre-K and regular kindergarten. We provide the first estimates of the impact of Michigan's TK program on 3rd grade test scores. Using an augmented regression...

At a time when the returns to college and graduate school are at historic highs, why do so many students struggle with their student loans? The increase in aggregate student debt and the struggles of today's student loan borrowers can be traced to changes in federal policies intended to broaden...

There is growing evidence on the importance of sleep for productivity, but little is known about the impact of interventions targeting sleep. In a field experiment among U.S. university students, we show that incentives for sleep increase both sleep and academic performance. Motivated by...

We use an admissions lottery to estimate the effect of a non-means tested preschool program on students' long-run earnings, employment, family income, household formation, and geographic mobility. We observe long-run outcomes by linking both admitted and non-admitted individuals to confidential...

Lottery-based identification strategies offer potential for generating the next generation of evidence on U.S. early education programs. Our collaborative network of five research teams applying this design in early education and methods experts has identified six challenges that need to be...

Federal incentives and requirements under the Obama administration spurred states to adopt major reforms to their teacher evaluation systems. We examine the effects of these reforms on student achievement and attainment at a national scale by exploiting the staggered timing of implementation...

Addressing climate change requires individual behavior change and voter support for pro-climate policies, yet surprisingly little is known about how to achieve these outcomes. In this paper, we estimate causal effects of additional education on pro-climate outcomes using new compulsory schooling...

A fundamental question for education policy is whether outcomes-based accountability including comprehensive educator evaluations and a closer relationship between effectiveness and compensation improves the quality of instruction and raises achievement. We use synthetic control methods to study...

The COVID-19 pandemic caused significant disruption in schooling in the U.S., and student test scores showed dramatic declines by the end of the 2020-21 school year. We use state test score data to analyze patterns of test score recovery over the 2021-22 school year. On average, we find that 20%...

Educators and policymakers have been concerned that the COVID-19 pandemic has led to substantial delays in learning due to disruptions, anxiety, and remote schooling. We study student achievement patterns over the pandemic using a combination of state summative and higher frequency benchmark...