FINAL REPORT

San Antonio School Choice Research Project
June 1997

Executive Summary

From 1992 to 1996, the Center for the Study of Education Reform at the University of North Texas evaluated both a private and a public school choice program in San Antonio, Texas.  The private program, sponsored by the Children's Educational Opportunity (CEO) Foundation, provides scholarships to low income parents to enroll their children in private schools.  The public program, offered by the San Antonio Independent School District (SAISD), selects students from across the district to study foreign language and culture (called "the multilingual program").  The study focused on five groups of "choosing" families as well as one group of randomly selected "nonchoosing" families (i.e., SAISD families whose children attended assigned neighborhood schools, also called attendance-zone schools).  The choosing families included those whose children: (1) enrolled in the public multilingual program; (2) applied to the multilingual program but could not enroll due to limited enrollment space; (3) already attended private schools and received CEO scholarships; (4) received CEO scholarships and transferred from public to private schools; and (5) already attended private schools, applied and were placed on the waiting list for CEO scholarships.  The researchers supplemented survey information from these groups with surveys of teachers, interviews with school administrators, field observations at nine representative schools, and reviews of archival records.  Grants from the U.S. Department of Education and private foundations funded the research.  The study findings include the following:

1.  Relative to nonchoosing parents, choosing parents are more educated, wealthier, more involved in their children's education at home and at school, and hold higher educational expectations for their children's education.  They also have fewer children.

2.  Children applying to choice programs have higher standardized test scores than nonchoosing students.  The test scores of students applying to the SAISD multilingual program are higher than those of students using the CEO scholarship to enroll in private schools.  This difference is largely a factor of program design.   The CEO program emphasizes giving low-income children private school opportunities while the SAISD multilingual program emphasizes superior academic performance.

3.  CEO private school choosers are more likely to be non-Hispanic whites and significantly less likely to be African-American than are SAISD public school choosers.  Private school choosers also are more religious and more educated but have lower incomes than public choosers.  These differences are caused in part by the design of the choice programs.

4.  Parents of children who used the CEO scholarship to move from a public to a private school were more involved in their child's education prior to the move to a choice school than were public choosing parents.  However, participation in choice program does not increase parental involvement.

5.  parents who used the CEO scholarship to move their children from public to private schools were very dissatisfied with their prior public schools.   They are very satisfied with their child's private school.

6.  Parents whose children enrolled in the SAISD multilingual program were highly satisfied with their prior public school and remain highly satisfied with the multilingual school.  However, the satisfaction levels of parents whose children were not admitted into the multilingual program declines significantly during the study.   Further, their involvement in their children's education also declines.

7.  Nonchoosing families are very satisfied with their public schools.

8.  Among families who used the CEO scholarship to transfer from public to private schools, the student dropout rate over the study period was 49.6%.   Major factors were (a) inability to get into the private school of first choice, (b) insufficient funds, and (c) lack of transportation.  Catholic students and students whose parents attended church more frequently were significantly less likely to drop out of the CEO program.

9.  Approximately one-third of the students who entered the SAISD multilingual choice program dropped out during the study period.  Three factors predict which students will remain more than one year in the program:  (a) the student participated in the decision process to apply and enroll in the program, (b) the student's best friend attends the same middle school, ;and (c) the student has high scores on the standardized math test.

10.  For reasons outlined in this report, comparisons between public and private school students regarding student achievement are exceedingly difficult.   While students in both the SAISD multilingual program and private schools show marginal improvements in standardized reading scores and marginal declines in math, their test score results are not substantively significant unless compared with the substantial drop in test scores for students in SAISD attendance-zone schools  The students who fare worst are those who applied to the multilingual program but could not enroll.

11.  Private school teachers are less likely than public school teachers to hold master's degrees or to be certified.  Private school teachers also have less teaching experience and are less likely to be from minority ethnic groups than their public school counterparts.

12.  The attitudes of private and public school teachers are generally similar with regard to their schools, but private school teachers are more likely to view their schools as conducive to learning.  Teachers at attendance-zone middle schools are the least likely to find the school environment conducive to students achievement, the least likely to have contact with parents, and the most likely to indicate student discipline is a problem

13.  Teachers at private and public choice middle schools assign more homework and have higher expectations for student performance than their counterparts at attendance-zone public schools.

14.  Students at choice schools have more favorable attitudes toward their schools than do students at attendance-zone public schools.  Students at attendance-zone schools are more likely to feel fighting is a problem at their school and less likely to feel school rules are fair.

15.  According to students, the values addressed in the instructional program at private, public choice, and public attendance-zone schools differ little, with the exception of religion.  Religion is identified as the value receiving the most emphasis at private schools and the least emphasis at public schools.  Civic values are reportedly addressed as frequently in private schools as in public schools.