Success for All? Estimating the Effect of a Mandatory College-Prep Curriculum in Michigan

Sue Dynarski - Professor, University of Michigan

Professor Dynarski will present results on the effect of the Michigan Merit Curriculum, which requires high school students to complete a rigorous college-preparatory curriculum, including four years of math, two years of science and two years of a foreign language. We use an interrupted time-series design to estimate program effects on test scores and educational attainment. We find that the new curriculum increased dropout rates among students who entered high school with low test scores, but increased science scores on the AP and the ACT.