New Releases by Ellen Schwartz

"In 2009, an Italian town suffers an earthquake and Holocaust survivors, whom the town helped during WWII, return to aid in the recovery"--

A writer and educator reflects on the idealistic, tumultuous, and eye-opening time she spent as a back-to-the-land hippie homesteader in Kootenays in the 1970s. What compelled a nice Jewish girl from the suburbs of New York to spend a decade of her life as a hippie homesteader in the BC wilderness? Galena Bay Odyssey traces Ellen Schwartz’s journey from a born-and-raised urbanite who was terrified of the woods to a self-determined logger, cabin-builder, gardener, chicken farmer, apiarist, and woodstove cook living on a communal farm in the Kootenays. Part memoir, part exploration of what motivated the exodus of young hippies—including American expatriates, like Ellen and her husband, Bill—to go “back to the land” in remote parts of North America during the 1960s and ’70s, this fascinating book explores the era’s naivety, idealism, and sense of adventure. Like most “back to the land” books, Galena Bay Odyssey describes the physical work involved in clearing land, constructing buildings, and living off of what they produced, but it also traces the complicated journey of discovery this experience brought to Ellen and Bill. Now, nearly half a century later, Ellen reflects on what her homesteader experience taught her about living more fully, honestly, and ecologically.

Students with disabilities (SWDs) educated in traditional public schools alongside general education students (GENs) typically move to middle school in sixth grade, rather than continuing in a K-8/12. The documented negative effects of this move on GEN academic outcomes suggests similar negative--and perhaps larger--effects on SWDs. Using an instrumental variables strategy and NYC data on nine cohorts of students, we find the middle school transition causes a 0.30 (0.16) standard deviation decline in SWD math (ELA) performance and increases grade retention. Low-income SWDs and SWDs with a specific learning disability or emotional disturbance fare worse. However, the move does not widen the SWD-GEN gap, suggesting the need to ease the middle school transition for all students.

Prior research has provided little evidence that subsidized housing investments generate significant external benefits to their neighborhoods. This paper revisits the external effects of subsidized housing, exploring the case of New York City. Relying on geocoded administrative data, we estimate a difference-in-difference specification of a hedonic regression model. We find significant and sustained external benefits. Spillovers increase with project size, and decrease with distance from the project sites and with the proportion of units in multi-family, rental buildings. Our results are robust to alternative specifications. Some of the benefit appears due to the effect of the replacement of existing disamenity.

There is increasing concern about risky behaviors and poor mental health among school-aged youth. A critical factor in youth well-being is school attendance. This study evaluates how school organization and structure affect health outcomes by examining the impacts of a popular urban high school reform -- “small schools” -- on youth risky behaviors and mental health, using data from New York City. To estimate a causal estimate of attending small versus large high schools, we use a two-sample-instrumental-variable approach with the distance between student residence and school as the instrument for school enrollment. We consider two types of small schools - “old small schools,” which opened prior to a system-wide 2003 reform aimed at increasing educational achievement and “new small schools,” which opened in the wake of that reform. We find that girls enrolled in older small schools are less likely to become pregnant, and boys are less likely to be diagnosed with mental health disorders than their counterparts in large schools. Both girls and boys enrolled in more recently opened small schools, however, are more likely to be diagnosed with violence-associated injuries and (for girls only) with mental health disorders. These disparate results suggest that improving a school''s organization and inputs together is likely more effective in addressing youth risky behaviors than simply reducing school size.

Few communities welcome federally subsidized housing, with one of the most commonly voiced fears being reductions in property values. Yet there is little empirical evidence that subsidized housing depresses neighborhood property values. This paper estimates and compares the neighborhood impacts of a broad range of federally subsidized, rental housing programs, using rich data for New York City and a difference-in-difference specification of a hedonic regression model. We find that federally subsidized developments have not typically led to reductions in property values and have in fact led to increases in many cases. Impacts are highly sensitive to scale, though patterns vary across programs.

Daily life experiences provide the subtexts for the poems and stories of this book. Hopes, dreams, and disappointments are woven into the authors’ story lines. Fantasy and humor provide exclamation points on the pages. This book is an enjoyable read as you curl up with a cozy cup of coffee.

This paper examines the relationship between the timing of SNAP benefit payments and participation in school lunch and breakfast using the National Household Food Acquisition and Purchase Survey (FoodAPS). An event study approach examines participation over the five-day window before and after the SNAP payment. We find that school lunch participation decreases 17 to 23 percentage points immediately after the SNAP payment among 11-18 year olds while breakfast drops 19 to 36 percentage points. The decline begins the day prior to payment. We find no effects for 5-10 year olds. Models examining participation over the full SNAP month using individual fixed effects yield similar findings. Among teenagers, participation in school lunch and breakfast decline in the first two weeks of the SNAP month, increasing afterwards. Non-school meals show the opposite pattern. Overall, results indicate SNAP households rely more on school lunch and breakfast toward the end of the SNAP month. Adolescents substitute away from school meals to non-subsidized meal options earlier in the SNAP benefit cycle.

Set in Vancouver''s Japan Town in 1942 and following two close friends, a Jewish 10-year-old girl named Esther and a Japanese Canadian 10-year-old girl named Michiko who fall in love with two dolls - Princess Margaret and Princess Elizabeth. Needless to say there are tears and drama, involving the forced resettlement of Michiko and her family and the disappearance of Esther''s great-aunt Anna, who remains in Germany.

A poignant coming-of-age novel for middle-grade readers about a young boy obsessed with baseball whose life changes drastically when war comes to his Vancouver Japanese community. Ten-year-old Kenny (Kenji in Japanese) worships his older brother, Mickey (Mitsuo), a baseball hero whose outstanding performance on the Asahi baseball team has given him fame and popularity. Despite Kenny''s suspected heart condition, he is determined to practice secretly with Mickey so he, too, can one day try out for the Asahi. But world events soon overtake life in this quiet community. When Japan attacks Pearl Harbor in 1941, everything for Kenny and his family spirals out of control: schools are closed, businesses are confiscated, fathers are arrested and sent to work camps in the BC interior and mothers and children are relocated to internment camps. When Mickey is arrested for a small act of violence, Kenny manages to keep his family''s spirits up, despite the deplorable conditions in camp. Coming across a "vacant" field covered with scrap wood, broken shakes and torn tar paper, Kenny gets permission to clear it and convert it into a baseball field. One by one, the boys in the camp pitch in, and the work gives purpose to their long days. Kenny''s persistence, hard work and big dreams shape the teen he is to become in this story of happiness found despite all odds.

This study examines the role of school sub-city districts in determining the performance/efficiency of their member schools. The study identifies low and high performing schools and sub-city districts using a three- year panel of data on New York City elementary and middle schools. The results suggest that districts "matter" to school performance, even when they have no revenue raising responsibility. The implication is that accountability systems need to be designed to recognize the role of school districts, and hold them accountable for their performance as well.

The plight of urban schools and their failure to adequately and efficiently educate their students has occupied the national discussion about public schools in America over the last quarter century. While there is little doubt that failing schools exist in rural and suburban locations, the image of city school systems as under-financed, inefficient, inequitable and burdened by students with overwhelming needs is particularly well entrenched in the modern American psyche. As the largest school district in the country, New York City attracts particular attention to its problems. To some extent, this image reflects realities. New York City school children, like many urban students around the country, are more likely to be poor, non-white and immigrants, with limited English skills, and greater instability in their schooling, and the new waves of immigrants from around the world bring students with a formidable array of backgrounds, language skills, and special needs. The resulting changes in the student body pose particular challenges for schools. At the same time, despite a decade of school finance litigation and reform, New York continues to have trouble affording the class sizes, highly qualified teachers and other resources that suburban neighbors enjoy. Finally, there is evidence of continuing segregation and disparities in performance between students of different races and ethnicities.

This paper explores the determinants of resource allocation across schools in large districts and examines options for improving resource distribution patterns. Previous research on intra-district allocations consistently reveals resource disparities across schools within districts, particularly in the distribution of teachers. While overall expenditures are sometimes related to the characteristics of students in schools, the ratio of teachers per pupil is consistently larger in high poverty, high-minority and low-performing schools. These teachers, though, generally have lower experience and education levels -- and consequently, lower salaries -- as compared to teachers in more advantaged schools. We explore these patterns in New York City, Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio by estimating de facto expenditure equations relating resource measures to school and student characteristics. Consistent with previous research, we find schools that have higher percentages of poor pupils receive more money and have more teachers per pupil, but the teachers tend to be less educated and less well paid, with a particularly consistent pattern in New York City schools. The paper concludes with policy options for changing intra-district resource distributions in order to promote more efficient, more equitable or more effective use of resources. These options include allocating dollars rather than teacher positions to schools, providing teacher pay differentials in hard-to-staff schools and subjects, and adapting current district-based funding formulas to the school (and student) level.

Problem: Policymakers and community development practitioners view increasing subsidized owner-occupied housing as a mechanism to improve urban neighborhoods, but little research studies the impact of such investments on community amenities. Purpose: We examine the impact of subsidized owner-occupied housing on the quality of local schools and compare them to the impacts of city investments in rental units. Methods: Using data from the New York City Department of Education (DOE) and the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD), we estimate three main sets of regressions, exploring student characteristics, school resources, and school outcomes. Results and conclusions: The completion of subsidized owner-occupied housing is associated with a decrease in schools'' percentage of free-lunch eligible students, an increase in schools'' percentage of White students, and, controlling for these compositional changes, an increase in scores on standardized reading and math exams. By contrast, our results suggest that investments in rental housing have little, if any, effect. Takeaway for practice: Policies promoting the construction of subsidized owner-occupied housing have solidified in local governments around the country. Our research provides reassurance to policymakers and planners who are concerned about the spillover effects of subsidized, citywide investments beyond the households being directly served. It suggests that benefits from investments in owner occupancy may extend beyond the individual level, with an increase in subsidized owner-occupancy bringing about improvements in neighborhood school quality.

High school reform is currently at the top of the education policy making agenda after years of stagnant achievement and persistent racial and income test score gaps. Although a number of reforms offer some promise of improving U.S. high schools, small schools have emerged as the favored reform model, especially in urban areas, garnering substantial financial investments from both the private and public sectors. In the decade following 1993, the number of high schools in New York City nearly doubled, as new "small" schools opened and large high schools were reorganized into smaller learning communities. The promise of small schools to improve academic engagement, school culture, and, ultimately, student performance has drawn many supporters. However, educators, policy makers, and researchers have raised concerns about the unintended consequences of these new small schools and the possibility that students "left behind" in large, established high schools are incurring negative impacts.

Research finds that small high schools deliver better outcomes than large high schools for urban students. An important outstanding question is whether this better performance is gained at the expense of losses elsewhere: Does small school reform lift the whole district? We explore New York City''s small high school reform in which hundreds of new small high schools were built in less than a decade. We use rich individual student data on four cohorts of New York City high school students and estimate effects of schools on student outcomes. Our results suggest that the introduction of small schools improved outcomes for students in all types of schools: large, small, continuously operating, and new. Small school reform lifted all boats.

The majority of existing research on mobility indicates that students do worse in the year of a school move. This research, however, has been unsuccessful in isolating the causal effects of mobility and often fails to distinguish the heterogeneous impacts of moves, conflating structural moves (mandated by a school''s terminal grade) and non-structural moves (induced by residential mobility or by access to a better school) for example. Moreover, there is little evidence on the effects beyond the first year of a move. In this paper, we obtain credibly causal estimates of the impact of mobility on performance in both the short and long run, addressing heterogeneity in the impacts of mobility and the endogeneity of moving. We do so using richly detailed longitudinal data for five cohorts of New York City public school students making standard academic progress from grades 1-8. We estimate the impact of moving to a new school in a model with student fixed effects and two alternative sets of instrumental variables--the grade span of a student''s first grade school and foreclosure/building sale--to isolate the causal effect of mobility that is likely planned and mobility that is likely due to unanticipated shocks, respectively. We find negative short-term as well as long-term effects of the structural moves built into the school system. Non-structural moves, however, have a positive effect on academic performance if they are made to join a new school at the beginning of that school''s grade span and, thus, more likely made for strategic reasons. Robustness checks indicate results are not sensitive to inclusion of school quality measures, pre-move trends in mobility, or alternative samples. In the conclusions, we discuss the importance of findings on the heterogeneous impact of school moves to the literature and to policy makers.

Ellen Schwartz''s newest book recounts for readers what she has learned as the mother of a child with a life-threatening disease. Her son Jacob''s extraordinary struggle with Canavan Disease and his impact on Ellen''s life as a wife, mother, friend and teacher has given her the unique perspective from which to view life''s most difficult challenges as its greatest gift. Written for those facing their own personal struggles, the lessons shared in Ellen''s book, explore the ripple effects of an extremely precious life- one that might have been tragic, but instead, is filled with hope, joy, and merit. This how-to format will help others facing life''s greatest challenges, whatever they might be.

We evaluate the effectiveness of small school reform as systemic reform in the nation''s largest school district, New York City. Using rich administrative data for four cohorts of students, we examine the extent to which graduation and testing outcomes improved for all students, not only those in small schools. Our findings show that high school outcomes improved overall, that these improvements were not driven solely by the positive effects observed in small schools, and that the results are robust to student characteristics and selection. Importantly, this paper provides insight into how the introduction of new small schools improves outcomes district-wide.

Participation in the federally-subsidized school breakfast program often falls well below its lunchtime counterpart. To increase take-up, many districts have implemented Breakfast in the Classroom (BIC), offering breakfast directly to students at the start of the school day. Beyond increasing participation, advocates claim BIC improves academic performance, attendance, and engagement. Others caution BIC has deleterious effects on child weight. We use the implementation of BIC in NYC to estimate its impact on meals program participation, BMI, achievement, and attendance. While we find large effects on participation, our findings provide no evidence of hoped-for gains in academic performance, nor of feared increases in obesity. The policy case for BIC will depend upon reductions in hunger and food insecurity for disadvantaged children, or its longer-term effects. The following are appended: (1) Mean Annual Breakfast and Lunch Participation Rates: Balanced Panel of Elementary and Middle School; (2) Impact of BIC adoption on meals program participation, 2001-2012--models using school specific linear time trends; (3) Impact of BIC on obesity and BMI--using grade-specific BIC treatment; (4) Impact of BIC on ELA and math achievement--using grade-specific BIC treatment; (5) Impact of BIC on obesity and BMI--using percent of BIC classrooms treatment; and (6) Impact of BIC on ELA and math achievement--using percent of BIC classrooms treatment.

Whether it’s for health, humane, or taste reasons, many young people are vegetarians. This is the perfect book to help them be healthy ones. It provides a history of vegetarianism, advice on balancing one’s diet, yummy food ideas, and, best of all, ways to cope with sticky situations. How do you handle the inevitable trips to the local burger joint? How do you resist Grandma’s attempts to get you to try just a bit of her famous roast turkey? How do you respond to dire predictions that it’s meat that makes you strong? For young people who are vegetarians, or for those who are thinking about making the switch, this is an invaluable resource.

This paper examines the effect of exposure to violent crime on students'' standardized test performance among a sample of students in New York City public schools. To identify the effect of exposure to community violence on children''s test scores, we compare students exposed to an incident of violent crime on their own blockface in the week prior to the exam to students exposed in the week after the exam. The results show that such exposure to violent crime reduces performance on English Language Arts assessments, and no effect on Math scores. The effect of exposure to violent crime is most pronounced among African Americans, and reduces the passing rates of black students by approximately 3 percentage points. Two appendices contain supplementary tables.

In this paper we provide the first rigorous evidence of the impact of a partnership between public middle schools and informal science institutions (ISIs), such as museums and zoos, on student outcomes. This study focuses on Urban Advantage (UA), a program in New York City (NYC) that explicitly draws upon the expertise and resources of the city''s ISIs, bringing these institutions together with NYC public schools to improve science education through intensive professional development, access to ISIs for teachers and students, and other science resources. We conclude that attending a UA school in eighth grade increases middle school science achievement, and there is some evidence that it may also increase the likelihood of passing standardized science exams in high school. [Major public support for Urban Advantage is provided by the Speaker and the City Council of New York and the New York City Department of Education.].

We evaluate the effectiveness of small high school reform in the country''s largest school district, New York City. Using a rich administrative dataset for multiple cohorts of students and distance between student residence and school to instrument for endogenous school selection, we find substantial heterogeneity in school effects: newly created small schools have positive effects on graduation and some other education outcomes while older small schools do not. Importantly, we show that ignoring this source of treatment effect heterogeneity by assuming a common small school effect yields a misleading zero effect of small school attendance. The following are appended: (1) Regents Examinations; (2) Definition of variables; (3) First stage, likelihood of attending a small high school; (4) Relationship between minimum distance to small schools and average student characteristics, by residence zip code; and (5) Full OLS and IV regression results.

Take a dash of colorful characters, a pinch of danger, and generous scoops of adventure and you have a terrific culinary mystery for young readers. Five cousins are looking forward to their annual vacation at their grandmother’s cottage. None of them knows that this may be their last such summer. A mining company has set its sights on the land and is determined to seize it. Grandma must produce the deed to prove that the property is really hers, but her memory is not what it used to be, and she can’t find it. The children suspect there may be clues to the deed’s whereabouts somewhere in the family’s cherished trove of recipes. But can they solve the mystery in time? Adult mystery buffs have had many culinary mysteries to choose from. Ellen Schwartz introduces her young readers to a delicious genre. She even provides easy-to-follow and yummy to eat recipes.

In this paper, we review policy levers that could potentially help close the achievement gap between African-American and white high school students, and draw on the literature to glean recommendations for superintendents, principals and education policy makers. We address, in turn: Policies to recruit and train teachers; policies to improve attendance, discipline and relationships among students and adults; policies to provide additional services to students; policies to increase the types of schools available to African-American teens; policies to engage parents and communities; and policies to effectively use data. In the end, students of all races benefit from good educational practices, adequate resources and strong support. Policies and interventions to improve the performance of African-American students will overlap significantly with those that would improve the performance of students of other races.

The recent foreclosure crisis has plagued nearly every city in the U.S., including New York City. Despite considerable attention to the causes of these mortgage foreclosures and the consequences they have had for communities, we know little about their impacts on individual families and children. Given that more than 2.8 million U.S. property owners received a foreclosure notice in 2010 alone; it is likely that large numbers of children are leaving their homes and moving schools, as well. This policy brief examines the prevalence of foreclosure among buildings housing New York City public school students and explores the relationship between foreclosures and student mobility. Specifically, the authors examine whether children who live in properties entering foreclosure are more likely than their peers to switch schools. Such mobility is of potential concern because research suggests that changing schools is often damaging to children''s academic performance (Hanushek et al., 2004; Schwartz et al., 2007). This brief also explores how the new schools the children attend after moving differ from their origin schools, in terms of student demographics and performance. Our research focuses primarily on elementary and middle school students who attended New York City public schools in the 2003-04 and 2006-07 school years. For additional information on our data and methods, see Been et al. (2011), "Kids and Foreclosures: New York City." Key finding include: (1) 20,453 public school students lived in buildings that entered foreclosure in 2006-07; (2) 61 percent of students living in buildings that entered foreclosure lived in 2-4 family or larger multi-family properties; (3) 57 percent of students living in buildings that entered foreclosure in 2006-07 were black, compared to 33 percent of all other students; (4) Public school students living in buildings in foreclosure were more likely to change schools in the year following a foreclosure notice than other students, and the effect was amplified for children in multi-family buildings; (5) Students living in properties that entered foreclosure were significantly less likely than their peers to leave the New York City public school system in the subsequent year; and (6) Students who moved to new schools after a foreclosure moved to lower-performing schools on average. The change in school quality was no more dramatic, however, than that experienced by other students who moved schools.

This paper examines the impact of the adoption of a universal free breakfast policy on student breakfast participation, attendance, and academic achievement. We examine a 2003 New York City policy change that made school breakfast free for all students regardless of income while increasing the price of lunch for those who pay full price. Using a difference-in-difference estimation strategy, we derive plausibly causal estimates of the policy''s impact by exploiting within and between group variation in school meal pricing before and after the policy change. We conduct school-level analyses of the policy''s impact on breakfast participation, and student-level analyses to explore the impact on attendance and test scores. Our estimates suggest that universal free breakfast increased breakfast participation both for students who experienced a decrease in the price of breakfast and for free-lunch eligible students who experienced no price change. The latter suggests that universal provision may alter behavior through mechanisms other than price, perhaps through a decrease in stigma, highlighting the potential merits of universal provision over and above targeted services. Our analysis also suggests that the policy change had a small positive effect on attendance for black and Asian students.

Immigration and migration to New York City (NYC) collectively create a dynamic population of students. In this brief the authors use a decade of detailed, longitudinal data on NYC''s 1st-8th graders to explore both the "stock" of students enrolled and the "flow" of new entrants in each academic year. Together, these paint a portrait of how newly entering immigrant students shape the ever evolving diversity of NYC public schools. New York City''s elementary and middle schools receive between 20,000-30,000 new students in grades 2-8 every year. These students come from all over the world, speak over 175 different languages, and differ from the stock of students previously enrolled. Although the composition of new students varies annually, the variation manifests itself in both predictable and surprising ways. The research consistently shows that roughly half the new entrants in any year are native-born and that the flow of native-born students differs from the flow of foreign-born students, particularly in language skills and exposure to English at home. In the early grades, new entrants are disproportionately native-born, but as students age, the flow becomes increasingly foreign-born. Therefore, disentangling these groups and being more precise about "which" immigrants or "which" new students are examined is important in determining policy interventions. Four questions are addressed in this brief: (1) How many new students are there? (2) How have immigrants changed in the past decade? (3) Do new immigrant students lag behind native-born entrants on standardized exams? and (4) With whom do the new entrants go to school and are their schools different? This brief is intended to provide insight into this important group of newly entering students and to shed light on the variation in this population between nativity groups, over time, and across grades. Two supplemental tables are appended: (1) Total enrollment in NYC public schools; and (2) Foreign-born population in NYC.

New York City (NYC) is home to the largest school district in the U.S., with over one million students and more than 1,600 schools. While it is only one of approximately seven hundred school districts in New York State (NYS), the city educates about one-third of the state''s students. In recent work examining school finance during Mayor Bloomberg''s first two terms, Stiefel and Schwartz (2011) compared NYC''s funding sources with those for the rest of the state in entirety. The NYS statistics presented in that chapter were, therefore, averages for all other school districts in the state--including the fiscally-stressed "Big Four" (Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and Yonkers), rural districts with their own, unique challenges, and relatively wealthy suburban districts. This brief builds upon that research--describing the changes in revenues for the city, other large urban districts, wealthy downstate counties surrounding NYC, and the rest of the state. This analysis uses revenue data from the New York State Education Department''s (NYSED) annual fiscal profiles to compare the educational resources available to NYC relative to other districts in New York State and probe the differences in greater detail. Specifically, the authors examine the change in total revenue, total state revenue, local revenue, and total expenditures excluding debt service and transportation expenses for New York City, the other Big Four, two wealthy downstate counties (Westchester and Nassau), and the remaining schools districts in New York State. An appendix contains supplemental tables.