The Effects of Scholarship Amount on Yield and Success for Master's Students in Education

Abstract

The amount of merit-based scholarship support for graduate students in the United States has increased dramatically. Given this increased investment, does increasing the size of scholarships awarded to the most academically able admitted students substantially increase their probability of enrollment? We found no support for a positive answer to the question. Our study is unique in the literature in two important ways. First, the design randomly assigned admitted students to size of scholarship. Second, the size of scholarship varied from substantial ($10,000) to substantially larger ($18,500). The applicants in the study were the most academically able applicants to master's programs in a graduate school of education at an elite university. It may be that the difference between no scholarship support and some scholarship support (e.g., $10,000) might have a positive effect on yield. Natural variation data from the same site supported this conclusion. It may be that dramatically larger amounts of scholarship support would have a positive effect on yield as well (e.g., the full cost of tuition).