Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. In this paper, we examine the impact of school closures on student performance using data from Maryland public schools. We begin by describing the context within which unscheduled school closure decisions occur, and how these might affect student performance. Terms of use: Documents in D I S C U S S I O N P A P E R S E R I E SWe then describe relevant research by economists, and our empirical approach. Next we discuss our results, and finally consider their implications.

Practical research experience has been seen as an important tool to enhance learning in STEM fields and shape commitment to science careers. Indeed, this was a prominent recommendation of the Boyer Commission. Further, there is evidence this is especially important for minority students. In this paper, we examine the role of practical research experience during the summer for talented minority undergraduates in STEM fields. We focus on the link between summer research and STEM Ph.D. program matriculation. We examine evidence on this question using detailed data on students participating in the Meyerhoff Scholarship Program over a 14 year period at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. Our results provide evidence of strong positive effects of summer research on participation in STEM Ph.D. programs. Further, we show that the effects of summer research vary with the frequency and timing of these experiences. The evidence that educational strategies such as summer research experiences improve academic outcomes of minorities is vital, given concern about the science pipeline in the U.S. and the continuing growth in the racial/ethnic diversity of the college-age population.

Using the 2000 follow-up of the National Education Longitudinal Survey, the authors estimated earnings effects of a community college education. Previous research relied on data collected from students enrolled 20 or 30 years ago. Because the labor market and community colleges have changed dramatically since then, the authors provide an update by studying students enrolled in the 1990s. They found substantial evidence that a community college education has positive effects on earnings among young workers. This effect was larger for annual earnings than for hourly wages. Earnings benefits accrued both to those who failed to earn a credential and to those who earned an associate degree. The current results are similar to estimates for earlier cohorts. The stability of the wage advantage of a community college education during a period of growing enrollment provides evidence of a growing relative demand for a community college over a high school education.

Previous studies attempting to estimate the relative importance of family, neighborhood, residential stability, and homeownership status characteristics of childhood environments on young adult outcomes have: (1) treated these variables as though they were independent, and (2) were limited in their ability to control for household selection effects. This study offers advances in both areas. First, it treats the key explanatory variables above as endogenously determined (sometimes simultaneously so). Second, to deal both with this endogeneity and the selection problem, instrumental variable estimates are computed for how childhood average values of neighborhood poverty rate relate to fertility, education and labor market outcomes in later life. The paper analyzes data from the US Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) that are matched with Census tract data, thereby permitting documentation of a wide range of family background and contextual characteristics. For children born between 1968 and 1974, data are analyzed on their first 18 years and various outcomes in 1999 when they are between 25 and 31 years of age. The application of instrumental variables substantially attenuates the apparent neighborhood effects. Nevertheless, support is found for the proposition that cumulative neighborhood poverty effects averaged over childhood have an independent, non-trivial causal effect on high school attainment and earnings.

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