Parents gauge school quality in part by the level of student achievement and a school's racial mix. The importance of … cutoffs for the most selective of these schools move from above-average schools to schools with students drawn from the … extreme upper tail. Exam school students can also expect to study with fewer nonwhite classmates than unsuccessful applicants …

at the expense of students who are most diffiult to teach, including limited English proficiency (LEP) and special … education (SPED) students, as well as students with low baseline achievement levels. We use applicant lotteries to evaluate the … special needs students that may be underserved. The results show average achievement gains of 0.36 standard deviations in math …

school students, while non-urban charters reduce achievement from a higher baseline. Student demographics explain some of …