How do charter school options affect student discipline in traditional public schools in Arkansas?

A research paper entitled “,” by ACRE Policy Analyst Dr. Mavuto Kalulu, ACRE Scholar and BT����Associate Professor of Economics Dr. Thomas Snyder, and former ACRE Undergraduate Research Fellow and BT����Alumnus Aaron Newell, was published in the November 2019 edition of the Quarterly Review of Business Disciplines.��

The Quarterly Review of Business Disciplines is a journal of the Academy of Business Disciplines sponsored by the University of North Florida.��

The authors examine the effect charter schools have on student behavior in traditional public schools. They find that an increase in charter school enrollment is associated with fewer disciplinary infractions in traditional public schools in Arkansas.

From the authors:

In Arkansas, charter enrollment appears to be a win-win for students in both types of schools. Existing Arkansas studies have shown that students perform well in charter schools compared to traditional public schools, and that student performance improves under competition. Our study shows that charter schools also reduce the disciplinary infractions at traditional public schools.��Teachers have listed classroom behavior as a major obstacle. Charter schools can provide alternative approaches and competition that can benefit traditional public schools. State and local governments can look to charter schools to help alleviate the disciplinary issues in the traditional public schools and improve student performance.”

The research paper was a project Newell undertook with Kalulu and Snyder during his tenure as an ACRE Undergraduate Research Fellow in the spring semester of 2018. Newell is currently a first-year law student at Bowen School of Law.

By Caleb Taylor

How should public schools allocate funding to get better student outcomes?

Morgan Burke, an ACRE Fellow and BT����biology student, recently wrote an op-ed for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette titled “,” arguing that Arkansas is misallocating its spending on administrative funding when the money could be better spent on instructional funding.

Burke, along with BT����Associate Professor of Economic and ACRE Scholar Thomas Snyder examined the relationship between spending and student performance on the Arkansas Augmented Benchmark Exam. They conclude that a negative relationship exists between growing administration expenses and student performance.

Burke says:

Administration expenditures have a negative influence on student performance while instructional expenses have a positive effect. Therefore, districts should move money away from administrative expenses to instructional expenses. By transferring money, school systems can bring us closer to the average performance on a national level.”

She also points to academic research in other places and by other scholars that have similar findings. To read the full op-ed, go .

For more of ACRE researchers’ work on this issue, go here.

Morgan Burke is a part of ACRE’s Research Fellowship Program. In this program, students work with a professor to write a publishable research paper that is presented at the annual Society of Business, Industry, and Economics conference. Burke has been working with BT����Associate Professor of Economics Thomas Snyder on an academic research paper that investigates the relationship between school spending and student outcomes over the course of the 2018-2019 academic year.