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ERIC Number: EJ918172
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2011-Mar
Pages: 24
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0162-3737
EISSN: N/A
The Non-Cognitive Returns to Class Size
Dee, Thomas S.; West, Martin R.
Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, v33 n1 p23-46 Mar 2011
The authors use nationally representative survey data and a research design that relies on contemporaneous within-student and within-teacher comparisons across two academic subjects to estimate how class size affects certain non-cognitive skills in middle school. Their results indicate that smaller eighth-grade classes are associated with improvements in several measures of school engagement, with effect sizes ranging from 0.05 to 0.09 and smaller effects persisting 2 years later. Patterns of selection on observed traits and falsification exercises suggest that these results accurately identify (or possibly understate) the causal effects of smaller classes. Given the estimated earnings impact of these non-cognitive skills, the implied internal rate of return from an eighth-grade class-size reduction is 4.6% overall, but 7.9% in urban schools. (Contains 15 notes, 10 tables, and 2 figures.)
SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: http://sagepub.com
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Grade 8; Middle Schools
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Assessments and Surveys: National Longitudinal Survey of Youth
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A