Alex Hollingsworth, Ohio State University

Only one-third of U.S. elementary school students are proficient readers. This is despite spending over $12,000 per student per year, a considerable amount accounting for nearly 30% of all state and 8% of all national expenditures. A large literature has developed to improve in classroom inputs, focusing on pedagogy, optimal class size, mode of instruction, and teacher trainings among many other inputs. A similarly large literature explores how out of-class room effects, such as parental wealth, nutrition, sleep, and pollution exposure affect learning and performance on exams. Using rich administrative, we explore how both change in mode of instruction and pollution exposure affects short- and long-run scores on standardized reading exams. We further explore how pollution exposure, which has been shown to independently affect the ability to learn, interacts with improved modes of instruction. We find evidence that nudging school districts towards phonics-based reading instruction improves test scores. We find that those cohorts exposed to phonics-based reading instruction are less likely to be affected by pollution shocks on the day of their exam than their untreated peers. Finally, we show that pollution shocks on the day of the exam affected scores substantially more than pollution shocks in the preceding months and school year.

DATE: Friday, September 13th, 2024

TIME: 3:30-5:00 p.m.

LOCATION: 444 Fronczak Hall