The effects of school choice on achievement gaps between private and public high schools: Evidence from the Seoul high school choice program

Abstract

In 2010, Seoul began a universal school choice program for high schools. The implementation of school choice introduced autonomy, competition, and sorting, barely existent when public and private schools were under strong governmental control. Using school-level panel data, this study investigated how a newly introduced school choice policy affected achievement gaps between private and public high schools. We found evidence that competition and autonomy have minimal impacts on the achievement of private and public high schools. However, we found that student sorting did significantly increase the achievements of private high schools, widening existing gaps between public high schools.