New Research: Wisconsin School Choice Students Make Greater Academic Gains Over Time
The News: The Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) released groundbreaking new, peer-reviewed academic research analyzing more than 100,000 low and middle-income Wisconsin students between the 2018-19 and 2022-23 school years, finding that students who remain in Wisconsin’s private school choice programs for multiple years make significantly greater gains in reading than comparable public-school students. The analysis measures performance on the English/Language Arts (ELA) portion of the Wisconsin Forward Exam.
The study is the first comprehensive student-level analysis of the statewide Wisconsin Parental Choice Program and Racine Parental Choice Program, as well as the first student-level analysis of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program in 15 years. It is stronger than other research in recent years that relied on school-level analysis. The Wisconsin and Racine results have been peer-reviewed and published in the Journal of School Choice; the Milwaukee analysis using similar methods is currently under review at an academic journal.
The Quote: WILL Research Director, Will Flanders, stated, “This groundbreaking research provides some of the clearance evidence yet; school choice is a win for students. Our peer-reviewed analysis focuses on low-and-middle-income Wisconsin students who are the sole participants in Wisconsin’s unique choice programs. Our research should serve as a fire alarm for states evaluating new limitations or even repealing their choice programs. Make no mistake, those students will suffer due to their misjudgment.”
Director of the Free Enterprise Center at Concordia University-Wisconsin, Dr. Scott Niederjohn, stated, “Our research was subject to rigorous academic scrutiny during the peer review process. The result was clear: the longer students participate in the ‘Choice Program’ the better their academic results, on average.”
