Economics of Education Reform

Catalog description

(Also offered as PP 5337 .) Examines a number of prominent education reform strategies, using economics as a lens through which to understand the motivations for and potential impacts of each. Economics enables us to focus on the incentives created by these policies, allowing us to predict their intended and unintended consequences. We will utilize this framework throughout the course as we read about and evaluate the effectiveness of various educational interventions and policy reforms. Topics include (among others): class size reduction, teacher quality and teacher certification, merit pay, school accountability, school choice, school finance reform, early childhood education, and topics in higher education.