| Michael Goetz
University of Wisconsin, Madison
When money really matters: Tying resources of specific program elements to students' academic growth
Despite an increasing number of studies and the use of more sophisticated statistical techniques to study the effects of education resources on student achievement, the relationship between resources and academic performance remains inconclusive. Further, researchers seldom calculate the cost-effectiveness of particular programmatic strategies, so policy makers often do not have the information necessary to make informed decisions. Using the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (ECLS-K) database, this dissertation explores the relationship between resources and the academic growth of first-grade students, as mediated by the programs that students experience in school, analyzing the cost-effectiveness of school and classroom level policies that practitioners have the power to control. Because methodological and theoretical frameworks remind us that students are embedded within classrooms, which are embedded within schools, this dissertation uses three-level hierarchical linear modeling to test hypotheses. Further, the ingredients method helps to determine the cost aspects of the programs' cost-effectiveness ratios. This dissertation adds to the resource effects and cost-effectiveness literature, providing policy makers and practitioners insight into effective programs and efficient resource.use.
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