TY - JOUR
T1 - Not Too Late
T2 - Improving Academic Outcomes among Adolescents
AU - Guryan, Jonathan
AU - Ludwig, Jens
AU - Bhatt, Monica P.
AU - Cook, Philip J.
AU - Davis, Jonathan M.V.
AU - Dodge, Kenneth
AU - Farkas, George
AU - Fryer, Roland G.
AU - Mayer, Susan
AU - Pollack, Harold
AU - Steinberg, Laurence
AU - Stoddard, Greg
N1 - Funding Information:
* Guryan: School of Education and Social Policy, Northwestern University (email: j-guryan@northwestern. edu); Ludwig: Harris School of Public Policy, University of Chicago (email: jludwig@uchicago.edu); Bhatt: Education Lab, University of Chicago (email: mbhatt@uchicago.edu); Cook: Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University (email: pcook@duke.edu); Davis: Department of Economics, University of Oregon (email: jda-vis5@uoregon.edu); Dodge: Sanford School of Public Policy, Duke University (email: dodge@duke.edu); Farkas: School of Education, University of California, Irvine (email: gfarkas@uci.edu); Fryer: Department of Economics, Harvard University (email: rfryer@fas.harvard.edu); Mayer: Harris School of Public Policy, University of Chicago (email: s-mayer@uchicago.edu); Pollack: Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice, University of Chicago (email: haroldp@uchicago.edu); Steinberg: Department of Psychology, Temple University (email: laurence.steinberg@temple.edu); Stoddard: Crime Lab, University of Chicago (email: gstoddard@uchicago.edu). Chinhui Juhn was the coeditor for this article. This paper was made possible by the generous support of the AbbVie, Bank of America, Laura and John Arnold, Paul M. Angell, Edna McConnell Clark, Crown, Lloyd A. Fry, Joyce, Logan, MacArthur, Polk, Pritzker-Pucker, Smith Richardson, and Spencer foundations, the Chicago Center for Youth Violence Prevention, EquiTrust, J-PAL North America, the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority, the city of Chicago, grant 2012-JU-FX-0019 from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Office of Justice Programs, US Department of Justice, and award 1P01HD076816 from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development of the National Institutes of Health. We are also grateful for operating grants to the University of Chicago Crime Lab from Susan and Tom Dunn, Ira Handler, and the MacArthur, McCormick and Pritzker-Pucker foundations. For vital assistance in making this work possible, we thank Chad Adams, Roseanna Ander, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, Trayvon Braxton, Valerie Chang, Akeshia Craven, Rukiya Curvey-Johnson, Gretchen Cusick, Aarti Dhupelia, Tony DiVittorio, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Wendy Fine, Jaureese Gaines, Michael Goldstein, Antonio Gutierrez, Craig Howard, Tim Jackson, Barbara Kelley, Ed Klunk, Timothy Knowles, Tim Lavery, Stig Leschly, Jonathan Lewin, Daniel Lopez, Julia Quinn, Arnaldo Rivera, Janey Rountree, Alan Safran, Leonetta Sanders, Maitreyi Sistla, Julia Stasch, Sara Stoelinga, Elizabeth Swanson, Robert Tracy, Karen Van Ausdal, and John Wolf, as well as the staffs of the Chicago Public Schools system, Match Education, and Saga Education. Thanks to Jeffrey Broom, Sarah Dickson, Kylie Klein, Stacy Norris, and Jared Sell for their help in accessing the data we analyze here, and to Nathan Hess, Stephanie Kirmer, Daniel Kowalski, Khoa Nguyen, Kelsey Reid, Michael Rosenbaum, Catherine Schwarz, Noah Sebek, Carolyn Silverman, Weiyu Wang, Robert Webber, Nathan Weil, and David Welgus for their invaluable contributions to the data analysis. For useful suggestions we thank seminar participants at Harvard, Microsoft Research, New York University, UCLA, and the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin, as well as the editor and referees. This study was approved by the University of Chicago’s committee on human subjects as IRB13-0691 on June 24, 2013. This RCT was registered in the American Economic Association Registry for randomized control trials under trial AEARCTR-0000041. All opinions (and any errors) are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the US Department of Justice, National Institutes of Health, or any other funder.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 American Economic Association. All rights reserved.
PY - 2023/3
Y1 - 2023/3
N2 - Improving academic outcomes for economically disadvantaged students has proven challenging, particularly for children at older ages. We present two large-scale randomized controlled trials of a high-dosage tutoring program delivered to secondary school students in Chicago. One innovation is to use paraprofessional tutors to hold down cost, thereby increasing scalability. Participating in math tutoring increases math test scores by 0.18 to 0.40 standard deviations and increases math and nonmath course grades. These effects persist into future years. The data are consistent with increased personalization of instruction as a mechanism. The benefit- cost ratio is comparable to many successful early childhood programs.(JEL H75, I21, I24, I26, I32, J13, J15).
AB - Improving academic outcomes for economically disadvantaged students has proven challenging, particularly for children at older ages. We present two large-scale randomized controlled trials of a high-dosage tutoring program delivered to secondary school students in Chicago. One innovation is to use paraprofessional tutors to hold down cost, thereby increasing scalability. Participating in math tutoring increases math test scores by 0.18 to 0.40 standard deviations and increases math and nonmath course grades. These effects persist into future years. The data are consistent with increased personalization of instruction as a mechanism. The benefit- cost ratio is comparable to many successful early childhood programs.(JEL H75, I21, I24, I26, I32, J13, J15).
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85151855094&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85151855094&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1257/aer.20210434
DO - 10.1257/aer.20210434
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85151855094
SN - 0002-8282
VL - 113
SP - 738
EP - 765
JO - American Economic Review
JF - American Economic Review
IS - 3
ER -