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Exploiting quasi-experimental variation in levels of capital funding, we provide new evidence on the asymmetric effects of investments in educational facilities on academic achievement. We merge data from 4 million 3rd–8th graders in Texas with school bond outcomes and school openings. We find meaningful differences in the impact across the top and bottom quintiles of the pre-treatment achievement distribution, a result supported by the peer effects literature and a “reshuffling’ of higher performing students into new schools. The mean impact of bond passage on reading and math scores is positive – at roughly 1/10th of a standard deviation. However, the effect on the lowest scoring students is four times as large, while the effect reverses in direction for the highest performing students.
Schlaffer et al. (Tue,) studied this question.