The NYC High School Admissions Study—a research initiative led by RSF visiting scholar Jennifer Jennings (Princeton University), Sarah Cohodes (Columbia University), Sean Corcoran (New York University), and Carolyn Sattin-Bajaj (Seton Hall University)—has released a new working paper on the results of an intervention designed to help disadvantaged public school students in New York City better navigate a complex high school admissions process. 

The NYC Department of Education’s school choice program currently requires all eighth graders attending public school to apply for high school by submitting an application ranking up to 12 academic programs from more than 750 offered in 440 high schools in the city. As Jennings and colleagues note, due to the complexity of the admissions process and the sheer number of choices, “disadvantaged students—including free lunch eligible, black and Hispanic, and students who do not speak English at home—are more likely to choose and subsequently ‘match’ (be assigned) to high schools with lower graduation rates.” However, they continue, “If complexity and lack of information are part of the explanation for the gaps we observe, simplified information about school options may help level the playing field.”

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Simplified information on New York City high schools (Source: Sean Corcoran)

To test this hypothesis, the team conducted a field experiment in 165 high-poverty NYC middle schools during the 2015-2016 academic year. Students at participating schools were randomly assigned to a control group or to one of three intervention groups. All intervention groups received a custom list of 30 high schools with graduation rates of 70% or higher and within 45 minutes by public transportation from the middle school. Two of the groups also received supplemental lists highlighting academically non-selective high schools or high schools organized by their academic interest area. In the executive summary of their findings, available on the NYC High School Admissions Study website, the team states:

1. Students who received our custom lists used them when making choices. They were more likely to apply to our specific high school recommendations than students who did not receive our lists.
2. Students who received our custom lists were more likely to receive their first choice high school and were less likely to match to a high school with a graduation rate below 70%. Students both applied to schools at which they had higher odds of admission and avoided lower-performing schools on their applications.
3. Both disadvantaged and advantaged students used the custom lists to make choices. However, in some cases advantaged students saw greater benefits from them, by applying and matching to more schools on our custom lists.

These findings suggest that providing students with simplified information on high schools can not only increase the likelihood that they apply to higher-performing schools, but can also help them identify the schools where their odds of admission are higher. However, the authors also caution, “broad-based informational interventions will not necessarily reduce inequality, since both disadvantaged and advantaged students respond to and benefit from them.”

Read more about the study.