In a new study, researchers found that catholic schools are no longer superior to public schools, with both producing similar academic success results.
Researchers from Michigan State University found that while math scores for Catholic students dropped between kindergarten and eighth grade, it increased slightly for public school students. In addition, Catholic students saw no significant increase in reading scores or better behavioral outcomes between kindergarten and eighth grade.
"Across many outcomes, both academic and behavioral, we don't find anything that seems to point to a real benefit of Catholic schools over public schools," said Todd Elder, MSU associate professor of economics.
This is the first study to look into test scores of students' right from kindergarten in both Catholic and public schools. Previous studies have stated that Catholic school students perform much better on an average than public school students. This difference is most likely due to higher socioeconomic status of families who send their children to Catholic schools.
However, this new study questions previous findings asking why the achievement gap doesn't widen as Catholic students progress through school. In fact, when it comes to math scores, the public school students closed the gap somewhat by the eighth grade.
One explanation Elder presents for this is that Catholic school teachers typically make less than public school teachers. He reveals that in 2008, private elementary school teachers had an average salary of $35,730 compared to $51,660 in public schools
"Some people say Catholic schools are doing more with less," Elder said. "But these findings suggest they're not doing more with less - that they may, in fact, be doing less with less."
Other reasons for lower Catholic school achievements could be because public schools have better designed curricula. In addition to math and reading scores, the study looked at behavioral outcomes and other factors including absence, suspensions, tardiness and repeating grades.
"Taken together," the study says, "the estimates in this paper do not point to any beneficial effects of Catholic primary schooling."
