Does Head Start Improve Children's Life Chances? Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Design

Abstract

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. This paper exploits a new source of variation in Head Start funding to identify the programs effects on health and schooling. In 1965 the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) provided technical assistance to the 300 poorest counties in the U.S. to develop Head Start funding proposals. The result was a large and lasting discontinuity in Head Start funding rates at the OEO cutoff for grant-writing assistance, but no discontinuity in other forms of federal social spending. We find evidence of a large negative discontinuity at the OEO cutoff in mortality rates for children ages 5-9 from causes that could be affected by Head Start, but not for other mortality causes or birth cohorts that should not be affected by the program. We also find suggestive evidence for a positive effect of Head Start on educational attainment in both the 1990 Census, concentrated among those cohorts born late enough to have been exposed to the program, and among respondents in the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988. Terms of use: Documents in Does Head Start Improve Children's Life Chances?Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Design AbstractThis paper exploits a new source of variation in Head Start funding to identify the program s effects on health and schooling. In 1965 the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) provided technical assistance to the 300 poorest counties in the U.S. to develop Head Start funding proposals. The result was a large and lasting discontinuity in Head Start funding rates at the OEO cutoff for grant-writing assistance, but no discontinuity in other forms of federal social spending. We find evidence of a large negative discontinuity at the OEO cutoff in mortality rates for children ages 5-9 from causes that could be affected by Head Start, but not for other mortality causes or birth cohorts that should not be affected by the program. We also find suggestive evidence for a positive effect of Head Start on educational attainment in both the 1990 Census, concentrated among those cohorts born late enough to have been exposed to the program, and among respondents in the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988.

The Effects of School Spending on Educational and Economic Outcomes: Evidence from School Finance Reforms

“…In 2SLS b the first-stage model include as predictors the number of school-age years of exposure to school finance reform interacted with the median districtpredicted reform-induced change in school spending in the state. 1972-2010Annually 1987-2010Annually 1987-20101987, 1990, 1993, 1999, 2007 Previous historical data on per pupil expenditures was only available in a readily usable format via the Census of Governments: School System Finance (F-33) File (U.S. Bureau of the Census, Department of Commerce). The Census of Governments previously was only conducted in years that end in a two or seven, so at the time when many important papers on SFRs were written, there were many years of missing data.…”

“…1 undetected by test scores (e.g. Heckman, Pinto, & Savelyev, 2014;Deming 2009;Jackson, 2012;Chetty, Friedman and Rockoff, 2013;Ludwig and Miller, 2007). We address the limitations of focusing on test scores as our main outcome by focusing on the effect of school spending on longrun outcomes such as educational attainment and earnings.…”

Can universal pre-kindergarten programs improve population health and longevity? Mechanisms, evidence, and policy implications

“…Pre-kindergarten programs have been evaluated using RCTs (Campbell et al, 2014;Muennig et al, 2011a,b;Muennig et al, 2009), at least one regression discontinuity analysis (Ludwig and Miller, 2007), and case-control studies (Palfrey et al, 2005;Reynolds et al, 2001). These all show an impact on behavioral risk factors for health or actual measures of health.…”

“…However, a regression discontinuity study of the broader Head Start program (unrelated to the above mentioned RCT) showed reductions in mortality for children aged 5 to 9 (Ludwig and Miller, 2007). These reductions in childhood mortality were thought to arise from the funding and technical assistance provided by the Office of Economic Opportunity in 1965 to develop Head Start programs.…”

Is this Early Childhood Development Ours? Deciphering what African Parents want their Children to Learn in Early Childhood Development

“…This acknowledgement has been based on research that has been conducted in the developed world (Barnett & Masse, 2007;Camilli, Vargas, Ryan, & Barnett, 2010;Ludwig & Miller, 2007) and in East Africa (Malmberg, Mwaura, & Sylva, 2011). In response to this trend, some African governments have tried to adapt best practices from the western world that follow normative western ideologies about child development (Pence & HixSmall, 2009).…”