Do School Buses Make School Choice Work?

While school choice has been well studied, there is little existing research exploring the role of transportation, in general, and school buses, in particular, to school choice decisions. The authors examine the effect of school buses on school choice decisions using data on kindergarten students and their eligibility for transportation assistance in New York City public schools in 2017. Using both conditional logit school choice models and regression discontinuity designs, the authors provide both descriptive and credibly causal evidence on the impact of school proximity, bus eligibility, and their interaction on school choice decisions. The authors' results indicate that proximity and buses both matter. Specifically, while distance significantly deters choice, school bus eligibility increases the likelihood of choosing a school by 1.4 to 4 percentage points (or 12 to 30 percent). Compared to a high-quality school, the authors find that bus eligibility has twice as large an impact on reducing the negative distance effect in the 0.5 to 1 mile range from school (27% versus 12%). These results will be useful for policy makers looking to leverage school transportation policy to improve school choice decisions, and ultimately student outcomes.

• Record URL:
  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2020.103607
• Record URL:
  http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0166046220302921
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/01660462
• Supplemental Notes:
  • © 2020 Published by Elsevier B.V. Abstract reprinted with permission of Elsevier.
• Authors:
  • Trajkovski, Samantha
  • Zabel, Jeffrey
  • Schwartz, Amy Ellen
• Publication Date: 2021-1

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Web
• Features: Appendices; Figures; References; Tables;
• Serial:
  • Regional Science and Urban Economics
  • Volume: 86
  • Issue Number: 0
  • Publisher: Elsevier
  • ISSN: 0166-0462
  • Serial URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/01660462

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Accessibility; Logits; Regression analysis; School buses; Schools
• Geographic Terms: New York (New York)
• Subject Areas: Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Planning and Forecasting; Public Transportation;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01759690
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Nov 12 2020 3:19PM