Shifting the bell curve: the benefits and costs of raising student achievement.
Benefit-cost analysis was conducted to estimate the increase in earnings, increased tax revenues, value of less crime, and reductions in welfare costs attributable to nationwide implementation of rapid assessment, a promising intervention for raising student achievement in math and reading. Results suggest that social benefits would exceed total social costs by a ratio of 28. Fiscal benefits to the federal government would exceed costs to the federal treasury by a ratio of 93. Social benefits would exceed costs to each state treasury by a ratio no lower than 286, and fiscal benefits would exceed costs to each state treasury by a ratio no lower than 5, for all but two state treasuries. Sensitivity analyses suggest that the findings are robust to a 5-fold change in the underlying parameters.
Yeh
Stuart S
SS
University of Minnesota, Educational Policy and Administration, College of Education and Human Development, 330 Wulling Hall, 86 Pleasant Street, S.E., Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA. yehxx008@umn.edu
D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D004493:Education / Q000191:economics* / Q000379:methods; D005380:Financing, Government; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008433:Mathematics; D011932:Reading; D012922:Social Change; D012946:Social Welfare; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D014481:United States