Different Paths to College Success: The Impact of Massachusetts’s Charter Schools on College Trajectories

The charter school movement encompasses many school models. In Massachusetts in the 2010s, the site of our study, urban charter schools primarily used “No Excuses” practices, whereas nonurban charters had greater model variety. Using randomized admissions lotteries, we estimate the impact of charter schools by locality on college preparation, enrollment, and graduation. Urban charter schools boost all of these outcomes. Nonurban charter schools raise college enrollment and graduation despite reducing state test scores and AP enrollment. Notably, the nonurban charter college graduation edge is more than twice as large as that from urban charter attendance. (JEL H75, I21, I23, I28)