Journal Articles

Using Interviews to Understand the Assignment Mechanism in a Nonexperimental Study : The Case of Eighth Grade Algebra

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Many inquiries regarding the causal effects of policies or programs are based on research designs where the treatment assignment process is unknown, and thus valid inferences depend on tenuous assumptions about the assignment mechanism. This article draws attention to the importance of understanding the assignment mechanism in policy and program evaluation studies, and illustrates how information collected through interviews can develop a richer understanding of the assignment mechanism. Focusing on the issue of student assignment to algebra in 8th grade, I show how a preliminary data collection effort aimed at understanding the assignment mechanism is particularly beneficial in multisite observational studies in education. The findings, based on ten interviews and administrative data from a large school district, draw attention to the often ignored heterogeneity in the assignment mechanism across schools. These findings likely extend beyond the current research project in question to related educational policy issues such as ability grouping, tracking, differential course taking, and curricular intensity, as well as other social programs in which the assignment mechanism can differ across sites.

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Detail Information

Series Title

Evaluation Review

Call Number

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Publisher

Thousand Oak : sage publisher., 2011

Collation

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Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

0193841X

Classification

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Content Type

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Media Type

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Carrier Type

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Edition

Vol. 35 no. 5, October 2011,pp. 490-522

Subject(s)

Using Interviews to Understand the Assignment
Casual inference
Multisite evaluation
Assignment mechanism
Course taking

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