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Unintended Consequences—How Targeting Schools for Special Benefits in France Can Do More Harm Than Good

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Compensatory education policies—policies aimed at offsetting educational inequalities between socially and academically disadvantaged children and more advantaged students—are widely used and represent a significant part of public education spending in many countries. In France, they correspond to about ten percent of the annual spending per pupil. They provide underprivileged schools with additional resources to compensate for social and academic disadvantages. In a new JHR paper, Laurent Davezies (CREST) and Manon Garrouste (University of Lille) propose some evidence to explain why these programs are often not working as intended.
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Poorly Rated NYC Schools Attract Better Teachers

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The idea of holding schools accountable for students’ performance has stood at the center of school-reform efforts in the United States for more than two decades. One of the many questions that have been raised is whether accountability efforts could backfire by driving good teachers out of poorly rated schools, creating a vicious cycle for principals attempting to turn their institutions around.

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Does More Information, Like Releasing Test Scores, Improve Schools? Yes, But Not All

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The use of school accountability systems is becoming increasingly popular as a way of changing school behavior to improve school performance. School accountability systems can be divided into two broad categories: soft and hard accountability systems. Soft accountability systems provide information about school performance to parents, students, and the schools themselves, which can influence school behavior. Hard accountability systems tie rewards and punishments to school performance, directly affecting incentives faced by schools. A new study looks at the effect of releasing information about school performance on future performance.
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