Education and Economic Mobility: How Schools Shape Peer Composition and Student Trajectories

Abstract

The potentially equalizing role of schools is called into question when lower-income students increasingly attend different schools—and, within schools, different classrooms—than their higher-income peers. My dissertation examines how schools shape lower-income students’ peer composition and the implications for long-term outcomes. In the first paper, using data from Texas, a large and nationally representative state, I find that the median lower-income student experiences schooling with nearly ten times fewer upper-income classmates than their wealthier peers. To understand why exposure to upper-income peers may matter for long-term outcomes, I isolate peer effects from resource access using within-school, between-cohort variation in the share of upper-income students, controlling for school trends. I find that lower-income students in cohorts with more upper-income peers are marginally more likely to enroll in four-year colleges and earn higher wages. These effects do not appear to operate through changes in access to school resources; the increase in college enrollment seems to be driven by exposure to lower-achieving upper-income peers. The second paper bridges research on school choice and academic tracking by examining how the addition of advanced courses affects classroom and school peer composition. Public schools may introduce academic tracks to attract or retain upper-income and higher-achieving students. However, tracking can also exacerbate sorting by income and achievement within schools. Exploiting variation in the timing of Advanced Placement (AP) course additions within subjects, I find that adding an AP course increases lower-income students’ exposure to upper-income classmates. This increase is driven by a rise in the overall share of upper-income students at the school following the course addition, offsetting the increase in within-school sorting. In the third paper, my co-authors and I study the expansion of alternative schools for lower-performing students in Chicago. These schools offer tailored curricula and flexible scheduling, potentially improving graduation rates among students at high risk of dropping out. However, they may also segregate vulnerable students who otherwise may have graduated from traditional public schools. Using variation in the timing and proximity of school openings, we find that alternative schools increase high school persistence and reduce student arrests but reduce the likelihood of college enrollment.