Low-income students, even those with strong academic credentials, are unlikely to attend a highly selective college. With a field experiment, we test an intervention to increase enrollment of low-income students at the highly selective University of Michigan. We contact students (as well as their parents and principals) with an encouragement to…

I conduct a statewide experiment in Michigan with nearly 50,000 high-achieving high school seniors. Treated students are mailed a letter encouraging them to consider college and providing them with the web address of a college information website. I find that very high-achieving, low-income students, and very high-achieving, minority students are…

The U.S. Department of Education tested a set of promising, low-cost advising strategies, called "Find the Fit," designed to help low-income and "first generation" students enrolled in the Department's Upward Bound program choose more selective colleges and stay in until they complete a degree. About 200 Upward Bound projects…

One of the most important questions in education research is whether the gains from interventions for which perceived short-term success can be sustained. The possibility of short-lived impacts is especially relevant for research on charter schools, where charter operators who face high-stakes assessments have an incentive to "teach to the…