The Education Gap: Vouchers and Urban Schools

Acknowledgments

During the past six years, we have profited from the advice and assistance of a large number of talented, hardworking individuals. To begin, we wish to thank the principals, teachers, and staff of the private schools in New York City, Dayton, and Washington, D.C., who assisted in the administration of tests and questionnaires. We also wish to thank the School Choice Scholarship Foundation (SCSF) in New York City, Parents Advancing Choice in Education (PACE) in Dayton , the Washington Scholarship Foundation (WSF) in Washington, D.C., the Children’s Economic Opportunity (CEO) foundation in San Antonio, and the Children’s Scholarship Fund (CSF) for cooperating fully in these evaluations. David Myers of Mathematica Policy Research served as co-principal investigator of the evaluation of the SCSF scholarship program. Daniel Mayer and other MPR staff also provided important assistance. Kristin Kearns Jordan, Tom Carroll, and other members of the SCSF staff assisted with data collection in New York City. John Blakeslee, Leslie Curry, Douglas Dewey, Laura Elliot, Heather Hamilton, Tracey Johnson, Daniel la Bry, John McCardell, Ethel Morgan, and Patrick Purtill of the Washington Scholarship Fund provided support in D.C. T. J. Wallace and Mary Lynn Naughton, staff members of Parents Advancing Choice in Education, provided valuable assistance with the Dayton evaluation. Chester E. Finn Jr., Bruno Manno, Gregg Vanourek, and Marci Kanstoroom of the Fordham Foundation, Edward P. St. John of Indiana University, and Thomas Lasley of the University of Dayton lent valuable suggestions throughout various stages of research design and data collection in Dayton. xvii Acknowledgments file 01 frontmatter pp_i-xxii.qxd 3/14/02 2:11 PM Page xvii We thank William McCready, Robin Bebel, Kirk Miller, and other members of the staff of the Public Opinion Laboratory at Northern Illinois University for their assistance with data collection, data processing, conduct of the lottery , and preparation of baseline and Year I follow-up data. We are also grateful to Mike Gibson and Marc Tagliento for their help in securing family participation in the D.C. evaluation. We especially appreciate the insights and assistance of co-principal investigators of the Edgewood evaluations, David Myers of Mathematica Policy Research, Jay P. Greene of the Manhattan Institute (who also was a co-investigator on the Cleveland evaluation), and Rudolpho de la Garza of Columbia University (formerly at the Tomas Rivera Institute at the University of Texas at Austin). Cara Olsen and Kathy Sonnenfeld, members of Mathematica Policy Research, made major contributions in the design, data collection, and analysis stages of the research in Edgewood. Daniel Mayer and Julia Chou, also from Mathematica Policy Research, were instrumental in preparing the New York City survey and test score data. An earlier version of portions of this volume was presented at the Conference on Charter Schools, Vouchers, and Public Education held within the Taubman Center for State and Local Government at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government on March 9 and 10, 2000. The Program on Education Policy and Governance (PEPG) and the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research sponsored this conference. Funding for the conference was generously provided by the John M. Olin Foundation, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, and the Taubman Center for State and Local Government. We are deeply indebted to Chester E. Finn Jr. and Marci Kanstoroom for their assistance in preparing the conference. Papers presented at that conference have been published as Paul E. Peterson and David E. Campbell, eds., Charters, Vouchers, and Public Education (Brookings, 2001). Others who participated in the conference were Jeanne Allen, Alan Altshuler, Jeffrey Berry, Clint Bolick, John Brandl, Bruce Fuller, Howard Fuller, Charles Glenn, Scott Hamilton, Eric A. Hanushek, Mark Harrison, Bryan Hassel, Jennifer Hochschild, Caroline Minter Hoxby, Kristin Kearns Jordan, Thomas Kane, Lisa Graham Keegan, Elliot Mincberg, Michael Mintrom, Tom Mooney, James A. Peyser, David N. Plank, Richard Rothstein, Isabel Sawhill, and Kay Schlozman. During the course of our research, we received helpful advice from William Carbonaro, Charles Franklin, Bruce Fuller, Jay P. Greene, Jeffrey Henig, Paul Hill, Jennifer Hochschild, Caroline Minter Hoxby, Christopher Jencks, Henry Levin, Jens Ludwig, George Mitchell, Terry Moe, Derek Neal, Donald Rock, Donald Rubin, Isabel Sawhill, Phillip Shively, David Weimer, and John Witte. Research assistance was provided by Samuel Abrams, xviii acknowledgments file 01 frontmatter pp_i-xxii.qxd 3/14/02 2:11 PM Page xviii Matthew Charles, Joshua Cowen, Tina Elacqua, Brian Harrigan, Jennifer Hill, D...