The Impact of Year-Round Schooling on Academic Achievement: Evidence from Mandatory School Calendar Conversions

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: McMullen, Steven C.; Rouse, Kathryn E.
• 署名单位: Calvin University; Elon University
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL-ECONOMIC POLICY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1945-7731
• DOI: 10.1257/pol.4.4.230
• 发表日期: 2012
• 页码: 230-252
• 关键词: student-achievement

摘要

In 2007, 22 Wake County, North Carolina traditional calendar schools were switched to year-round calendars, spreading the 180 instructional days evenly across the year. This paper presents a human capital model to illustrate the conditions under which these calendars might affect achievement. We then exploit the natural experiment to evaluate the impact of year-round schooling on student achievement using a multi-level fixed effects model. Results suggest that year-round schooling has essentially no impact on academic achievement of the average student. Moreover, when the data are broken out by race, we find no evidence that any racial subgroup benefits from year-round schooling. (JEL H75, I21, I28, J24)