School-based management and charter schools [electronic resource] : Market-based education reform and limits on the exercise of choice.

9780496133987

2004

1 online resource (182 p.)

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Public school education is among the most important public policy issues in the U.S., but nevertheless public schools are generally considered to be failing students in the U.S. based on international test score comparisons, despite the fact that the U.S. spends more money per pupil than any other country. U.S. education economists refer to this situation as the puzzle of why "Money Doesn't Matter", and they frequently recommend reforms that increase freedom of choice in public education in order to improve student achievement. Exercise of choice can be thought of in terms of "voice" and "exit". School Based Management (SBM) is a major education reform that utilizes "voice" by permitting stakeholders in public education to vote locally on decisions affecting education; Charter Schools are a major education reform that utilize "exit" by giving students the option to transfer out of ordinary public schools that provide poor education. By advocating greater freedom of choice, U.S. education economist have implicitly relied on the ideology of the free market to reform public education in the U.S. This Dissertation uses panel data from the State of Texas, and identifies problems that can occur when the logic of private enterprise, is applied to the setting of public education. Although managers in private companies can maximize a single objective function, i.e., profits, the multi-task nature of educational outcomes, e.g., both test scores and equal treatment for all groups, may cause the analogy to break down. This Dissertation synthesizes relevant literature in the fields of Industrial Organization, Labor, and Public Economics, and attempts to test the empirical validity, in the setting of public education, of major theoretical contributions to Advanced Microeconomics, such as the Holmstrom-Milgrom Multi-Task Principal-Agent Model, the Myerson-Satterthwaite Theorem, and Arrow's Impossibility Theorem. This Dissertation finds that market-based educational reforms are not the proverbial "rising tide that lifts all boats", but rather that outcomes are heterogeneous, i.e., some groups of students are left behind.

Books / Online / Dissertations & Theses

English

July 12, 2011

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Yale University, 2004.

Yale University.