API-211: Program Evaluation and Education Policy

How does school spending affect student outcomes? What are the impacts of school vouchers on students who receive them and students who don’t? Can we estimate the effect of an individual teacher on student test scores? The answers to important questions in education policy often rely on claims about causal impacts of policies or programs. In this course, students will gain experience reading, critiquing, and replicating five common approaches to measuring program impacts: randomized trials, regression discontinuity, difference-in-differences, covariate adjustment (including “value-added” models), and matching. We will discuss recent quantitative evidence on important education policy topics, such as charter schools and vouchers, school spending, and college financial aid. The course will focus on quantitative impact evaluations, as opposed to qualitative or process evaluations. Many readings are drawn from the U.S. context, but we will also discuss papers that draw from international evidence. This course will teach students the skills to become informed consumers of quantitative impact evidence and contribute to evidence-based decision-making in education policy and practice.

Prerequisites: Successful completion of S-040 (HGSE), API-202 (HKS), or prior equivalent training in multiple regression.

Also offered by the Graduate School of Education as A-164. Please note, this is a jointly offered course hosted by another Harvard school and, accordingly, students must adhere to the academic and attendance policies of that school.