Do High Schools That Improve Short-Term Academic Performance Also Boost Long-Term Economic Mobility?

Mbekeani, Papay, Mantil, and Murnane (2026) examine how much high schools affect students’ long-term outcomes, including college enrollment, graduation, and earnings. They use longitudinal data from Massachusetts following five cohorts of ninth-grade students, combining administrative records and survey data. They find large differences across schools: students attending higher value-added schools are 11% more likely to enroll in college, 31% more likely to graduate from a four-year college, and earn about 25% ($10,500) more annually by age 30. They also find that schools improving test scores and college plans tend to produce stronger long-term outcomes.

Why This Article Was Selected for The Policy Scientist

This article addresses a central policy question: whether schools meaningfully shape long-term socioeconomic mobility, not just short-term academic performance. This is especially timely as policymakers reconsider accountability systems that have historically emphasized test scores rather than life outcomes. Mbekeani et al. (2026), who have an established body of work in school effectiveness, extend the literature by linking high school quality to adult earnings and degree attainment, building on prior value-added research. The dataset is unusually rich, combining administrative and survey data with longitudinal earnings records, which strengthens internal validity. The statistical approach is rigorous but observational; causal inference or experimental designs would further strengthen confidence in the findings.

Full Citation and Link to Article

Mbekeani, P. P., Papay, J. P., Mantil, A., & Murnane, R. J. (2026). Understanding high schools’ effects on longer-term outcomes. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 45(2). https://doi.org/10.1002/pam.70093

Central Research QuestionThis article investigates the extent to which high schools causally influence students’ longer-term outcomes, specifically college enrollment, four-year college completion, and adult labor market earnings. The authors aim to move beyond conventional accountability measures based on standardized test scores by asking whether the high school a student attends has persistent effects on life trajectories. A second, closely related question examines whether schools that are effective at improving short-term outcomes—such as test scores, attendance, academic progress, and college plans—are also the schools that generate stronger long-term outcomes. The study places particular emphasis on students from low-income families, given longstanding concerns about inequality of opportunity and the role of schooling in shaping socioeconomic mobility.

Previous LiteratureThe article builds on a substantial body of research examining school effectiveness, particularly the evolution from test-score-based accountability to value-added frameworks. Early work, including Persson and Tabellini (1994) and Alesina and Rodrik (1994), established the broader importance of institutions in shaping long-term outcomes, while education-focused studies under No Child Left Behind relied heavily on test scores as proxies for school quality. More recent research has shifted toward value-added models (VAMs), which attempt to isolate the contribution of schools to student learning by controlling for prior achievement and demographics. Studies such as Chetty et al. (2014) and Jackson et al. (2020) have demonstrated that school-level value-added measures can predict later-life outcomes, including earnings and college attainment. However, the literature remains limited in directly linking high school effects to adult outcomes, particularly across a broad set of schools rather than specialized or quasi-experimental contexts. This article extends that literature by examining multiple longer-run outcomes simultaneously and situating them within a multi-dimensional framework of school effectiveness.

DataThe study employs a comprehensive longitudinal dataset from Massachusetts, following five cohorts of first-time ninth-grade students who entered high school between 2002–2003 and 2006–2007. The dataset integrates administrative records from the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education with survey responses and external data sources. College outcomes are drawn from the National Student Clearinghouse, which provides near-universal coverage of postsecondary enrollment and completion. Earnings data are obtained from state unemployment insurance records, allowing the authors to measure labor market outcomes at approximately age 30. The dataset includes detailed covariates such as eighth-grade test scores, attendance, demographic characteristics, and survey-based measures of student expectations and family background. This combination of administrative and survey data is unusually rich, enabling more precise control for pre-existing differences across students and improving the credibility of estimated school effects.

MethodsThe authors employ school-level value-added models to estimate the impact of attending a particular high school on long-term outcomes. These models regress student outcomes on prior achievement, demographic characteristics, and additional survey-based controls, while including school fixed effects to capture each school’s contribution. The resulting estimates represent the relative effectiveness of schools in shaping outcomes, conditional on observed student characteristics. The study also uses a split-sample approach to address measurement error in value-added estimates and applies a “drift” methodology to avoid mechanical correlations when linking short-term and long-term outcomes. While the approach is methodologically rigorous and consistent with leading work in the field, it remains observational. The authors attempt to mitigate selection bias through extensive controls and validation exercises, but the absence of randomized assignment or quasi-experimental variation limits causal interpretation. Future research incorporating experimental or quasi-experimental designs would strengthen confidence in these findings.

Findings/Size EffectsThe study finds substantial variation across high schools in their effects on long-term outcomes. Students attending schools at the 80th percentile of the value-added distribution, compared to those at the 20th percentile, are approximately 11% more likely to enroll in college, 31% more likely to graduate from a four-year college, and earn about 25% more annually—roughly $10,500—by age 30. These effects are larger for low-income students, with earnings gains reaching approximately 35%. The authors also document meaningful standard deviations in school-level impacts, including a 14% difference in earnings associated with a one-standard-deviation increase in school quality. Importantly, the study finds that schools that improve tenth-grade test scores and increase students’ college plans tend to produce the largest long-term gains. However, correlations between different short-term outcomes are modest, suggesting that schools influence multiple dimensions of student development that are not fully captured by test scores alone. The interaction between test score gains and college aspirations is particularly notable, indicating that academic improvement and expectations jointly shape long-term success.

ConclusionThe findings demonstrate that high schools play a significant role in shaping students’ educational and economic trajectories well into adulthood. The magnitude of these effects suggests that school quality is a meaningful determinant of socioeconomic mobility, particularly for disadvantaged students. By linking short-term measures of school performance to long-term outcomes, the study provides evidence that commonly used accountability metrics capture only part of what schools contribute to student success. At the same time, the reliance on observational value-added models highlights the need for further research using stronger causal identification strategies. While the results are internally compelling, their generalizability beyond Massachusetts remains uncertain due to differences in institutional context and data systems. Nonetheless, the study represents a substantial contribution to the literature by integrating rich longitudinal data with a multi-dimensional framework of school effectiveness and by quantifying the long-term consequences of high school quality.