Does Attending a Charter School Reduce the Likelihood of Being Placed into Special Education? Evidence from Denver, Colorado

Winters, M. A., G. Clayton, and D. Carpenter (2017). Does Attending a Charter School Reduce the Likelihood of Being Placed into Special Education? Evidence from Denver, Colorado. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 39(3), pp: 448-463. (Author Copy) (Publisher Copy)

Abstract

We use administrative data to measure whether attending a charter school in Denver, Colorado, reduces the likelihood that students are newly classified as having a disability in primary grades. We employ an observational approach that takes advantage of Denver’s Common Enrollment System, which allows us to observe each school that the student listed a preference to attend. We find evidence that attending a Denver charter school reduces the likelihood that a student is classified as having a specific learning disability, which is the largest and most subjectively diagnosed disability category. We find no evidence that charter attendance reduces the probability of being classified as having a speech or language disability or autism, which are two more objectively diagnosed classifications.