School choice: an experimental study
TL;DR: The results suggest that replacing the Boston mechanism with either Gale-Shapley or Top Trading Cycles mechanism might significantly improve efficiency, however, the efficiency gains are likely to be more profound when parents are educated about the incentive compatibility of these mechanisms.
About: This article is published in Journal of Economic Theory.The article was published on 2006-03-01. It has received 350 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Preference.
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TL;DR: The Boston Public Schools (BPS) system for assigning students to schools is described in this paper, where the authors describe some of the difficulties with the current assignment mechanism and some elements of the design and evaluation of possible replacement mechanisms.
Abstract: After the publication of “School Choice: A Mechanism Design Approach” by Abdulkadiroglu and Sonmez (2003), a Boston Globe reporter contacted us about the Boston Public Schools (BPS) system for assigning students to schools. The Globe article highlighted the difficulties that Boston’s system may give parents in strategizing about applying to schools. Briefly, Boston tries to give students their firstchoice school. But a student who fails to get her first choice may find her later choices filled by students who chose them first. So there is a risk in ranking a school first if there is a chance of not being admitted; other schools that would have been possible had they been listed first may also be filled. Valerie Edwards, then Strategic Planning Manager at BPS, and her colleague Carleton Jones invited us to a meeting in October 2003. BPS agreed to a study of their assignment system and provided us with micro-level data sets on choices and characteristics of students in the grades at which school choices are made (K, 1, 6, and 9), and school characteristics. Based on the pending results of this study, the Superintendent has asked for our advice on the design of a new assignment mechanism. This paper describes some of the difficulties with the current mechanism and some elements of the design and evaluation of possible replacement mechanisms. School choice in Boston has been partly shaped by desegregation. In 1974, Judge W. Arthur Garrity ordered busing for racial balance. In 1987, the U.S. Court of Appeals freed BPS to adopt a new, choice-based assignment plan. In 1999 BPS eliminated racial preferences in assignment and adopted the current mechanism.
580 citations
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TL;DR: In this paper, the design of the New York City (NYC) High School match involved tradeoffs among efficiency, stability and strategy-proofness that raise new theoretical questions.
Abstract: The design of the New York City (NYC) High School match involved tradeoffs among efficiency, stability and strategy-proofness that raise new theoretical questions. We analyze a model with indifferences--ties--in school preferences. Simulations with field data and the theory favor breaking indifferences the same way at every school --single tie breaking-- in a student-proposing deferred acceptance mechanism. Any inefficiency associated with a realized tie breaking cannot be removed without harming student incentives. Finally, we empirically document the extent of potential efficiency loss associated with strategy-proofness and stability, and direct attention to some open questions.
442 citations
15 Jul 2015
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present the Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science (EES) report, which synthesizes and integrates the available research to provide guidance on assembling the science team; leadership, education and professional development for science teams and groups.
Abstract: The past half-century has witnessed a dramatic increase in the scale and complexity of scientific research. The growing scale of science has been accompanied by a shift toward collaborative research, referred to as “team science.“ Scientific research is increasingly conducted by small teams and larger groups rather than individual investigators, but the challenges of collaboration can slow these teams' progress in achieving their scientific goals. How does a team-based approach work, and how can universities and research institutions support teams? Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science synthesizes and integrates the available research to provide guidance on assembling the science team; leadership, education and professional development for science teams and groups. It also examines institutional and organizational structures and policies to support science teams and identifies areas where further research is needed to help science teams and groups achieve their scientific and translational goals. This report offers major public policy recommendations for science research agencies and policymakers, as well as recommendations for individual scientists, disciplinary associations, and research universities. Enhancing the Effectiveness of Team Science will be of interest to university research administrators, team science leaders, science faculty, and graduate and postdoctoral students.
402 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a polynomial-time algorithm for the computation of a student-optimal stable matching when priorities are weak is proposed, which relies on a stable improvement cycle.
Abstract: In several school choice districts in the United States, the student proposing deferred acceptance algorithm is applied after indifferences in priority orders are broken in some exogenous way. Although such a tie-breaking procedure preserves stability, it adversely affects the welfare of the students since it introduces artificial stability constraints. Our main finding is a polynomial-time algorithm for the computation of a student-optimal stable matching when priorities are weak. The idea behind our construction relies on a new notion which we call a stable improvement cycle. We also investigate the strategic properties of the student-optimal stable mechanism. (JEL C78, D82, I21)
343 citations
Cites background or result from "School choice: an experimental stud..."
...If μ is Pareto dominated by another stable matching ν, then it admits a stable improvement cycle.(8)...
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...As opposed to earlier computational simulations in the literature such as Chen and Sönmez (2006) with 36 students and 7 schools, and Kesten (2004) with 240 students and 12 schools, we conducted experiments with relatively large sets of schools and students....
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors analyze a model with indifferences in school prefer- ences and empirically document the extent of potential efficiency loss associated with strategy-proofness and stability and direct attention to some open questions.
Abstract: The design of the New York City (NYC) high school match involved trade-offs among efficiency, stability, and strategy-proofness that raise new theoretical questions. We analyze a model with indifferences—ties—in school prefer - ences. Simulations with field data and the theory favor breaking indifferences the same way at every school—single tiebreaking—in a student-proposing deferred acceptance mechanism. Any inefficiency associated with a realized tiebreaking cannot be removed without harming student incentives. Finally, we empirically document the extent of potential efficiency loss associated with strategy-proofness and stability, and direct attention to some open questions. (JEL C78, D82, I21)
336 citations
References
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors studied the relationship between college admission and the stability of marriage in the United States, and found that college admission is correlated with the number of stable marriages.
Abstract: (2013). College Admissions and the Stability of Marriage. The American Mathematical Monthly: Vol. 120, No. 5, pp. 386-391.
5,655 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1990TL;DR: The marriage model and the labor market for medical interns, a simple model of one seller and many buyers, and Discrete models with money, and more complex preferences are examined.
Abstract: Foreword Robert Auman Acknowledgment 1. Introduction Part I. One-To-One Matching: the Marriage Model: 2. Stable matchings 3. The structure of the set of stable matchings 4. Strategic questions Part II. Many-To-One Matching: Models in which Firms May Employ Many Workers: 5. The college admissions model and the labor market for medical interns 6. Discrete models with money, and more complex preferences Part III. Models of One-To-One Matching with Money as a Continuous Variable: 7. A simple model of one seller and many buyers 8. The assignment game 9. The generalization of the assignment model Part IV. Epilogue: 10. Open questions and research directions Bibliography Indexes.
2,166 citations
"School choice: an experimental stud..." refers background in this paper
...5 While students are exogenously priority ordered at each school, the “effective priorities’’ are endogenous under the Boston mechanism in the sense that each student who ranks a school as her kth choice is considered before each student who ranks it (k+1)th for each k....
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1,542 citations