The distributional effects of the multi-track year-round calendar: a quantile regression approach

Abstract

Year-round school (YRS) calendars that redistribute the 180 school days more evenly across the calendar year are growing in popularity. Learning loss theory predicts student response to year-round calendars could vary substantially across achievement levels. Existing research on the heterogeneous effects of YRS focuses on estimating mean treatment effects by subgroup. We instead use a quantile regression approach with school and grade-by-year fixed effects to estimate the distributional impact of year-round calendars using a natural experiment setting in Wake County, NC. Contrary to the prior literature, we find evidence of a positive impact of year-round calendars for the lowest-performing students. However, even for these students, the estimated academic impact is small.

Keywords:

• quantile regression
• achievement gaps
• year-round schooling

JEL Classification:

• I21
• I24
• I28

Notes

¹ For a detailed description of the policy change, see McMullen and Rouse (2012).

Additional information

Funding

We thank the McGregor Fellows program at Calvin College and the Calvin Alumni Association for supporting this research.