I thought I'd start a new series on promoting new working papers of the Department of Economics at the University of Missouri. Think of it as one of my initial contributions to the department. First up, for the month of December:
A Non-Experimental Evaluation of Curricular Effectiveness in Math (WP 09-13)
by Cory Koedel and Rachana Bhatt
(December 2009)
"This paper uses non-experimental data to evaluate curricular effectiveness. We show that non-experimental methods can be used to obtain causal estimates of curricular effects at just a fraction of what it would cost to produce analogous experimental estimates. Furthermore, external validity concerns that are particularly cogent in the context of curricular evaluations suggest that a non-experimental approach may be preferred. Our results provide important insights for educational administrators and policymakers. In the short term, we find large differences in effectiveness across some math curricula. However, like many educational inputs, the effects of math curricula do not persist over time, a result that would be quite costly to attain using experimental data. Across curricula adoption cycles, publishers that produce less effective curricula in one cycle do not lose market share in the next cycle. One explanation for this result is the dearth of information available to administrators about curricular effectiveness."