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Evaluation of the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program: Second Year Report on Participation
NCEE 2006-4003
April 2006

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Table A-1.  Data sources

Data sourcea        Description
Student assessments
  • Baseline, or pre-Program measures of student achievement for public school applicants will come primarily from the SAT-9 standardized assessment administered by DCPS as part of its spring testing program.b
  • Each spring after the baseline year, the study will administer the SAT-9 to all students who were offered scholarships as well as all members of the control group who did not receive a scholarship.
  • DCPS test score data will be obtained for all public school students in those years, to compare with the scores of students participating in the Program.c
Parent surveys
  • Surveys of parents (of all applicants) will be conducted in all 4 years of impact evaluation data collection.
  • Topics will include reasons for applying, satisfaction with school choices, perceptions of school safety, educational climate, and offerings.
Student surveys
  • Each year after baseline, surveys will be conducted with all applicants who are in grades 4 and higher.
  • Topics will include students’ satisfaction with their schools, perceptions of safety, and other characteristics of their school program and environment.
Principal surveys
  • Surveys will be conducted each year of principals of all public and private schools then operating in DC, including public charter schools.
  • Topics will include school organization, safety, climate, principals’ awareness of and response to the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program, and, for private school principals, why they are/are not participating.
a The research team originally planned to administer surveys to teachers, but this plan was dropped due to the higher than expected cost of student testing and the resistance of private school administrators to the burden of teacher-level data collection.
b Baseline achievement will be collected only for applicants from public schools; applicants who were already attending private schools will not be included in the impact analysis. For public school applicants who did not participate in regular DCPS testing in the year they applied to the Program (e.g., particularly children below grade 3), the study will administer the equivalent DCPS assessment to these students as soon as possible after application. All other data will be collected for all applicants, both from public and private schools.
c Beginning in spring of 2006, DCPS will administer a customized, criterion-referenced achievement test (CRT) for its accountability testing instead of the SAT-9. Since scores on the CRT are not directly comparable to scores on the SAT-9 administered for purposes of the evaluation, the performance report, which relies on DCPS accountability testing data for comparison, will be less reliable and informative than if the District were continuing to administer the SAT-9. The switch from the SAT-9 to the CRT will not affect the impact analysis, since members of both the treatment and control groups will be administered the same test (the SAT-9) by the evaluation team for purposes of determining Program impact.