“Over-subscribed urban charter schools that admit students by lottery have produced the largest improvement in student achievement. Comparisons of those who did and did not win charter school admissions lotteries in Massachusetts suggest that urban charter schools boost student achievement. In Explaining Charter School Effectiveness (NBER Working Paper No.17332), Joshua Angrist, Parag Pathak, and Christopher Walters find that student demographics are related to the extent of this improvement: urban charter schools are most effective for non-whites and low-baseline achievers. They also find that while over-subscribed urban charter schools that admit students by lottery have produced the largest improvement in student achievement, non-urban charter schools are uniformly ineffective in raising measured achievement.”
By Linda Gorman