Does Information About High-Performing and Close-to-Home Schools Affect Families' Choices on the OneApp?

Fam­i­lies in New Orleans, where almost all pub­licly fund­ed schools are char­ters, have the choice to enroll in schools across the city. To do so, they must rank their top choic­es using a cen­tral­ized enroll­ment sys­tem, the OneApp. How­ev­er, find­ing high-qual­i­ty, use­ful infor­ma­tion about local schools and pre‑K pro­grams can be dif­fi­cult and time con­sum­ing. Researchers Jon Valant and Lind­say Bell Weixler worked with NOLA Pub­lic Schools to help iden­ti­fy what kinds of infor­ma­tion may be use­ful for fam­i­lies decid­ing where to apply to school. They find that receiv­ing infor­ma­tion about high-per­form­ing and close-to-home schools increased the like­li­hood that fam­i­lies would request a seat at one of those schools. The effects of receiv­ing infor­ma­tion about high-per­form­ing schools were strongest for fam­i­lies of high school stu­dents and chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties. The researchers mailed, texted, and emailed infor­ma­tion to over 7,000 fam­i­lies with a child enter­ing pre‑K, kinder­garten, or 9^th grade this school year. Some fam­i­lies got a list of high-per­form­ing schools in their area, as mea­sured by stu­dent test score growth for K‑12 schools and class­room obser­va­tion scores for pre‑K. Oth­ers received a list of schools close to home. The key find­ings are: Receiv­ing infor­ma­tion about high-per­form­ing schools increased the chances that 9^th-grade appli­cants both applied to and were assigned to those schools by four per­cent­age points. Pre‑K and Kinder­garten appli­cants who received these lists were not affect­ed. Pro­vid­ing Kinder­garten appli­cants with lists of near­by schools increased the like­li­hood that they would apply to one of those schools by four per­cent­age points. How­ev­er, these appli­cants were no more like­ly to be assigned to a school near them. Pre‑K and 9^th grade appli­cants were not affect­ed. * Stu­dents with dis­abil­i­ties were 13 per­cent­age points more like­ly to apply to a high-per­form­ing school when they received a list of those schools and sev­en per­cent­age points more like­ly to be placed in one. This study fits into a grow­ing body of research that explores the resources and sup­port that fam­i­lies need in school sys­tems cen­tered on choice. Choice-based sys­tems often pose height­ened chal­lenges for fam­i­lies – not only find­ing rel­e­vant and up-to-date infor­ma­tion in a dynam­ic land­scape of schools, but also com­plet­ing mul­ti-step appli­ca­tion process­es and secur­ing safe and reli­able trans­porta­tion to school. These chal­lenges are espe­cial­ly hard on the most dis­ad­van­taged fam­i­lies. Pro­vid­ing use­ful, rel­e­vant infor­ma­tion about schools should be part of a larg­er strat­e­gy to help fam­i­lies effec­tive­ly exer­cise their role as deci­sion mak­ers in a choice-based system.

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