HOW DOES YOUR KINDERGARTEN CLASSROOM AFFECT YOUR EARNINGS? EVIDENCE FROM PROJECT STAR

RAJ CHETTY, JOHN N. FRIEDMAN, NATHANIEL HILGER,EMMANUEL SAEZ, DIANE WHITMORE SCHANZENBACH & DANNY YAGAN:

In Project STAR, 11,571 students in Tennessee and their teachers were randomly assigned to classrooms within their schools from kindergarten to third grade. This article evaluates the long-term impacts of STAR by linking the exper- imental data to administrative records. We rst demonstrate that kindergarten test scores are highly correlated with outcomes such as earnings at age 27, college attendance, home ownership, and retirement savings. We then document four sets of experimental impacts. First, students in small classes are signi cantly more likely to attend college and exhibit improvements on other outcomes. Class size does not have a signi cant effect on earnings at age 27, but this effect is imprecisely estimated. Second, students who had a more experienced teacher in kindergarten have higher earnings. Third, an analysis of variance reveals significant classroom effects on earnings.