-This study finds significant school SES effects when cross-sectional models are estimated.
-These effects largely disappear when longitudinal models are applied, namely, value-added and student fixed effect models.
– There are some statistically significant effects remaining for school racial composition in two of the states and for various subgroups, but the magnitudes of the effects are small.
-Peer SES has no effects or only very small effects on academic achievement
-Large school SES effects often found in cross-sectional studies are artifacts of aggregation and are not a sound basis for SES-based school integration policies.
– The commonly used cross-sectional models for student achievement produce sizable estimates for school SES effects which are often comparable with the effect for student SES. However, in properly specified models using longitudinal data that either (a) control for students’ prior achievement or (b) control for stable differences between students, the effects of school SES are very small.
– The analyses presented in this article do not support the widely held view that school SES and school racial composition have strong effects on student achievement.