This mixed-methods study aims to further understand how teachers improve over time--and specifically how white teachers can increase their racial competency and become more effective teachers to students of color--by bridging three previously distinct literatures in education research: the returns to teaching experience, teacher peer effects, and the impact of same-race teachers.

In fall 2016, the University of Michigan (UM) implemented the HAIL Scholarship Study, an RCT to test whether the offer of personalized financial aid can increase enrollment of students from low-income families. HAIL is a low-cost, personalized intervention providing a no-strings-attached, four-year guaranteed scholarship offer to high-achieving low-income students to attend UM. HAIL has been very successful— more than doubling application and enrollment at UM among Michigan students from low-income families. To better understand the mechanisms and take-up rates for the HAIL Scholarship Study, PIRL is conducting qualitative interviews with HAIL-eligible high school seniors in Michigan alongside a team at UM.

This mixed methods study with Nicholas Papageorge (Economics, JHU) examines how beliefs about educational attainment and anticipated adverse shocks (e.g., evictions, incarcerations or deaths of family members, or violence) relate to educational plans and actual attainment for disadvantaged youth. The project is methodologically unique in that qualitative data gathered through open ended interviews of students making decisions will be used to specify a structural econometric model of post-secondary educational decision-making. In turn, the structural model will shed light on what kinds of additional data should be collected to estimate parameters of a model that could be used to evaluate how counterfactual policies can improve outcomes.

This longitudinal, mixed methods study of white, black and Latino families in Cleveland and Dallas examines how housing choices intersect with the many challenges low to moderate income families face, and how the inevitable tradeoffs involved in choosing a residence affect child development.

This qualitative study conducts interviews with youth aged 15-24 who moved with the Moving to Opportunity (MTO) program. These interviews focus on education, employment, risky behavior, family formation, and mental health, delving into the rich array of social processes and contextual factors that may underlie differing outcomes for youth and their transition to early adulthood.

This project is a multi-method study of how residential mobility, family structure and schooling are tied together to affect youth outcomes. Overall objectives of the study include: Understanding how housing policy affects mobility and school changes and understanding the conditions under which housing instability is perpetuated.