John B. Willett

This project will evaluate the impact of high stakes (for students and schools or for schools only) testing in Massachusetts. Massachusetts began administering the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) mathematics and English/language arts examinations in 1998. For the class of 2003, the 10th grade tests became high-stakes exit examinations. Students must pass both tests in order to receive a high school diploma.

Given the current interest in national and state initiatives to expand early childhood programming, questions of under what conditions impacts can be sustained, and for whom, are of great practical importance. Among the unanswered questions in the literature are the effects of a uniform curriculum across a large-scale program and how such impacts vary depending on the specific curricula used. The proposed regression discontinuity study addresses this gap in the literature by examining the i...