The past three decades have seen charter schools emerge as a prominent and controversial alternative to traditional public schools. This policy brief examines "Thirty Years of Charter Schools: What Does Lottery-Based Research Tell Us?" which summarizes 40 studies that have used lottery research designs to analyze how charter schools…

The increasing concentration of wealthy students at highly selective colleges is widely perceived, but few analyses examine the underlying dynamics of higher education stratification over time. To examine these dynamics, the authors build an analysis data set of four cohorts from 1972 to 2004. They find that low-income students have made…

In an attempt to increase applications from low-income students, some selective 4-year colleges are developing programs to target and attract low-income students. However, relatively little research has looked at factors important in the college application process, and in particular, how these factors differ for low-income students. This paper…

The authors welcome and appreciate the comments of Eric Grodsky and Sigal Alon on their article "Shadow Education, American Style: Test Preparation, the SAT and College Enrollment." In their comments, Grodsky takes issue with several important theoretical and methodological aspects of their article and Alon highlights key processes…

Buchmann, Condron and Roscigno argue in their article, "Shadow Education, American Style: Test Preparation, the SAT and College Enrollment," that the activities in which students engage to prepare for college entrance exams are forms of shadow education, a means by which more advantaged parents seek to pass their privileged status along…

This study focused on the relationship between students' Advanced Placement Program[R] (AP[R]) performance in AP English Language, Biology, Calculus, and U.S. History, and their subsequent college success. For each AP Exam studied, students were divided into three groups according to their AP Exam performance (no AP Exam taken, score of 1 or 2,…

In this article, the author argues that traditional college entrance requirements exercise a detrimental effect on other elements of the educational system. She begins by looking at the way that the entire K-12 system is skewed toward meeting the needs of those students headed for selective colleges and universities and the way less successful…

This publication presents three working papers on the inadequacies and difficulties of successful transition from high school to college. These papers are derived from The Bridge Project, a six-state study of K-16 issues. These three papers do not attempt to cover all aspects of K-16 and transition issues. Consequently, the policy implications at…