The Determinants of High School Test Scores in Oklahoma

Abstract

Although social-science research finds that resource use-teacher-student ratios, teacher degrees, school characteristics, and so on have little or no positive effect on student learning, state educational reform, such as recently occurred in Oklahoma, usually emphasizes resource use. Are the researchers right and the reformers wrong, or could it be the other way around? This preliminary study of the educational production function in Oklahoma finds a positive effect of resources on learning. The different result may be because of a greater diversity of school districts in Oklahoma or because we use dummy variables to control county fixed effects. (H72, L32)