The most interesting aspects of school choice, to me, are the
outcomes associated with traditional public schools near newly opened “schools
of choice.” School choice was a fairly alien topic to me until graduate school.
I grew up in a town with one high school and the only school of choice was a
Catholic grade school. I am likely primarily interested in the effects of how
the competition generated by schools of choice change (or do not change)
traditional public schools due to the fact that my experiences as a student in
primary, secondary, undergraduate, and graduate school and my experiences as a
teacher have all been in public schools. Moreover, despite the focus of the
media, policy-makers, and researchers, schools of choice are, and will remain,
a small segment of the educational landscape.
Through reading the literature on the effects of
competition, I was surprised to learn the wide range of findings associated
with the effects of competition. In summary, studies have found that school
competition may improve[i],
impair[ii],
or have no effect[iii] on traditional public schools. Through
examining these studies, it became clear that while all of the studies claim to
examine the effects of competition, a wide range of measures and methods are
being used to define competition.
Thus, the problem. Educational researchers are seeking to
answer questions and inform policy makers about issues surrounding school
choice, but without agreed definitions and consistent measures, researchers
will likely continue to find conflicting evidence. This problem is not
exclusive to competitive effects, or even school choice, but it continues to be
a problem nonetheless. Obviously educational programs and policies do not exist
in a vacuum and solutions of chemistry or physics do not translate to studies
of school choice, but how can educational researchers build an evidence base
with a foundation that includes common definitions and measures?
I do not seek to answer this question here, but to start a
conversation that may one-day result in answers. What are your thoughts? What
is the next step? Is this even a problem?
by Matt Linick
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