It's Not How Much You Spend, It's How You Spend It: Preventing Juvenile Crime And Delinquency Through Innovative School Programs

The 1999 State of the Union Address included a "call to action" to improve school quality and provide citizens with safe streets, schools and neighborhoods through initiatives such as decreasing student-teacher ratios, enhancing teacher quality and offering innovative and after-school programs. This paper examines the relative efficacy of these initiatives on delinquency and juvenile crime. Juvenile criminal and delinquent participation respond favorably to smaller student-teacher ratios, increased instructional expenditures per pupil, and, especially, the implementation of after-school programs. These findings illustrate the potential of after-school programs to keep students safe and learning and, thus, provide valuable insight into how to most efficiently distribute educational spending.