Post-secondary education
What are Promises Made of? The Design of Local College Affordability Programs
U.S. postsecondary education is populated by hundreds of state and local affordability initiatives sometimes referred to as “Promise programs”, many of which claim to make college free or tuition-free. These programs vary tremendously in terms of what they provide, where they can be used, and… more →
Get a Skill, Get a Job, Get Ahead? Evaluating the Effects of Virginia’s Workforce-Targeted Free College Program
Tuition-free college programs are gaining momentum as policymakers address rising college costs and workforce readiness. Despite their growing adoption, limited research examines how workforce-focused eligibility criteria impact student outcomes beyond enrollment. This pre-registered study… more →
Who may enter? Qualification and ranking in centralized admission systems to higher education
Admission systems play a critical role in shaping educational opportunities by determining what choices are available to whom. Policy makers and institutions must balance multiple, often conflicting, goals which requires trade-offs between competing values. In this paper, we present core values… more →
Does Increased Agency Improve the Effectiveness of Self-Directed Professional Learning for Educators?
The role of teacher agency in professional learning has been the subject of several qualitative studies but has not yet been tested in an experimental setting. To provide causal evidence of the impact of teacher agency on the effectiveness of professional learning, we conducted a preregistered… more →
Investing in College Readiness: Societal Benefits and Costs of the El Dorado College Promise Program
A growing volume of research shows college promise programs increase the likelihood that students enroll in and complete college. Place-based promise programs provide a guaranteed college scholarship for students who attend a specified school district. We examine the societal benefits and costs… more →
Switching Schools: Effects of College Transfers
Over one-third of college students in the United States transfer between institutions, yet little is known about how transferring affects students’ educational and labor market outcomes. Using administrative data from Texas and a regression discontinuity design, I study the effects of a student’… more →
From Passive Promises to Proactive Guarantees: The Efficacy of Financial Certainty Interventions Among Automatically (In-)Admissible Students
Low-income high-achieving students are less likely than high-income peers to enroll in selective colleges. Financial certainty interventions can address administrative burdens that stifle their enrollment, even when colleges are tuition-free for them. However, we do not know whether these… more →
Education and the Gender Voting Gap
Women in the United States have outpaced men in both voter participation and educational attainment in recent decades. Since education is closely tied to political participation, we consider these trends in tandem and assess how much of the gender gap in voting is attributable to differences in… more →
A Family Affair: The Effects of College on Parent and Student Finances
Paying for college is often a family affair, with both parents and students contributing. We study the effects of college on family finances using administrative data on the universe of federal aid applicants in California linked to credit records. We provide the first comprehensive analysis of… more →
Do Dual Enrollment Students Realize Better Long-Run Earnings? Variations in Financial Outcomes Among Key Student Groups
This study considers whether dual enrollment is associated with students’ financial outcomes over a longer, twelve-year time horizon after high school graduation than previously analyzed in the existing literature. Using longitudinal administrative data that span K-12, higher education, and the… more →
Corequisite Course Models in California Community Colleges: Implementation Variation and Challenges
As community colleges and systems move away from developmental education and encourage students to enroll in introductory, college-level coursework to complete their math and English requirements, it is critical to provide students with additional academic supports to help them succeed. One such… more →
Return on Investment or Ripoff? Examining the Returns to New Master’s Degree Programs
Universities have created more than 14,000 new master’s degree programs in the last two decades, and much of this is likely driven by an effort to increase institutional revenues during challenging financial times. But this expansion in graduate education creates a risk that these new programs… more →
Early Impacts of the FAFSA Requirement in Texas
In 2021−22, Texas implemented a policy requiring all public high school seniors to complete a financial aid application. This paper examines the early impacts of this requirement on Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) completion rates and college enrollment using a difference-in-… more →
In the Wake of Dobbs: The Effect of State Abortion Bans on Women's College Choices
This paper studies the impact of state reproductive rights laws on women’s human capital decisions after the U.S. Supreme Court eliminated the constitutional right to abortion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022). Using data from the Common App, the undergraduate college… more →
Pinpointing Persistence in Alternative STEM Pipelines: Evidence from a Novel Coding and Apprenticeship Program
The shortage of STEM workers, particularly in computer science, is compounded by the underrepresentation of women and certain minoritized racial/ethnic groups in these fields. Efforts to address worker shortages and broaden participation include improving traditional STEM education pathways and… more →
GenAI-101: What Undergraduate Students Need to Know and Actually Know About Generative AI
In November 2022, OpenAI released ChatGPT, a groundbreaking generative AI chatbot backed by large language models (LLMs). Since then, these models have seen various applications in education, from Socratic tutoring and writing assistance to teacher training and essay scoring. Despite their… more →
How are Institutions Positioned on the Brink of the Enrollment Cliff?: Evidence from Ohio
Since 2018, institutions of higher education have been aware of the "enrollment cliff" which refers to expected declines in future enrollment. This paper attempts to describe how prepared institutions in Ohio are for this future by looking at trends leading up to the anticipated decline. Using… more →
Do Human Capital Adjustments Protect Youths from Structural Change?
Structural changes to labor demand can have lasting consequences on the employment and earnings of workers in affected industries and geographies. However, individuals coming of age may avoid similar fates if they internalize salient changes to the returns to education and adjust their human… more →
Understanding Variation in Post-College Earnings: Evidence from the U.S. Department of Education’s College Scorecard
Using the detailed college level data from the College Scorecard on students’ post-college earnings from the near universe of four-year colleges, we assess the usefulness of going beyond comparing colleges based only on median earnings and analyze the descriptive relationship between college… more →
Buying time: Financial aid allows college students to work less while enrolled
Many empirical studies have found that financial aid improves college attainment. Few have been able to test why. This study used administrative records of employment and earnings to get a more complete picture of students’ finances during college and test one potential mechanism: financial aid… more →