Jay P. Greene, Center for Civic Innovation at the Manhattan Institute
January 2002
Manhattan Institute senior fellow Jay P. Greene has just released the second edition of his state-by-state "freedom index." It ranks the states according to their levels of "education freedom" as measured by the availability of four kinds of education choices for families: charter schools, subsidized private schools, home-schooling and public-school choice. He then relates the extent of a state's educational freedom to its student achievement (as measured on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, using states' 8th grade math scores in 2000). While Greene does not prove (or claim to prove) that more educational freedom boosts academic achievement, he shows a "strong observable relationship" between them. He also examines the strength of a state's accountability system (using publicly available data) and relates it to academic achievement in a way that controls for prior test scores. As for education freedom itself, Greene finds that Arizona has the most (2.94 on his index), followed by New Jersey, Delaware, Florida and Minnesota. Hawaii has the least (0.88), with Utah, Rhode Island, West Virginia and Maryland just ahead of it. Vermont and Ohio are smack in the middle. You can obtain this 14-page report from the Manhattan Institute's Center for Civic Innovation at http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/cr_24.htm.
