Academic Impacts of Career and Technical Schools.

Abstract

This study presents findings from three cohorts of students - the classes of 2003, 2004, and 2005, in the School District of Philadelphia - that were admitted to the district's career and technical education (CTE) schools through a randomized lottery process. This study takes advantage of this so-called 'natural experiment' to compare high school academic outcomes for lottery applicants who were admitted with those for students who did not receive an acceptance. Results find that CTE students had significantly better outcomes in terms of graduation rates, credit accumulation, and the successful completion of the college preparatory mathematics sequence algebra 1, algebra 2, and geometry. Results for other outcomes such as the completion of science and foreign language course sequences, overall grade point average, and mathematics and reading comprehension achievement, were inconsistent across cohorts and statistical tests, neither favoring nor against students accepted to CTE schools.