What happened when schools paid high schoolers $50 a week, no strings attached? : NPR

JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:

Generally, we want kids to stay in school, and not just to stimulate their young minds. People with high school diplomas statistically make more money, have better health and generally stress our taxpayer-funded social services less than those without. So what if we were to pay students to keep them in class? Well, we have some data on this now. A study in New Orleans and Indianapolis gave $50 a week, no strings attached, to a few hundred low- and middle-income high schoolers. Over 40 weeks, each student got $2,000. The Rooted School Foundation helped facilitate the study in two of its charter schools. And Jonathan Johnson is founder and CEO of Rooted. He joins us now. Welcome.

JONATHAN JOHNSON: Thank you so much, Juana.

SUMMERS: So Jonathan, just start by telling me, what was the origin of this study?

JOHNSON: In 2020, our attendance dropped from 85% to 60%. When we asked families why, the answer was simple – money. Students were staying home to work or care for siblings. So we tested the simplest solution – just give them money. We saw that students who were in the treatment group attended 1.23 more days of school per semester. Giving $50 a week did move the needle with academic engagement, and we also saw a lot of other impacts.

SUMMERS: You’ve talked there about attendance. I wonder, did you see other improved academic outcomes like, say, better grades, for instance?

JOHNSON: We didn’t see a statistically significant improvement in GPA. And just something to keep in mind is that the study largely occurred over one semester of a school year. And so it’s very, very hard in the educational arena to see significant changes over just one semester. We would need to do it over an extended, you know, one-year…

SUMMERS: Right.

JOHNSON: …Maybe multiple-year study. So that’s just something for listeners to keep in mind.

SUMMERS: Now, some people may hear $2,000 per student per year helped keep them in school an average of 1.23 more days per semester and wonder, is that the most effective use of that kind of money?

JOHNSON: We think it is. There are very few interventions that local governments are funding or that states are funding that have randomized control trial evidence behind them. We think that, you know, if we extend that over a year or against multiple years, there’s a big bang for the buck there.

SUMMERS: One of the things that I found super interesting about this study is the fact that it was done with debit cards, so we know broadly what these young students spent that money on and how much money they saved. What stood out to you in that data?

JOHNSON: So about 45.8% of funds were spent on essentials like food. Another 12% or so were spent on transportation. So a majority of the spend that we saw was on meeting basic needs, which, interestingly, was consistent with how adults are spending money in similar types of programs across the country and world. Something else that stood out to me is that students saved an average of $300 by the program end. So the fact that students were given this money without conditions and, on the other side of that, demonstrating that with the increased trust they could be responsible, they could be reliable, was something that I didn’t anticipate at the start.

SUMMERS: Jonathan, I can imagine that some people out there might feel morally uneasy about the notion of paying kids in our society to do something that they’re, quote-unquote, “supposed to do,” like going to school, especially if some of them spend even just a fraction of that money on clothes or accessories, things that kids want but maybe wouldn’t necessarily fall into what we consider a bucket of needs. Have you thought about that?

JOHNSON: It was a concern that, frankly, I had going into the study. I mean, there was no evidence that this could be impactful. We ran a rigorous randomized control trial, and the evidence was clear that small amounts of money create big impacts in educational outcomes. And for us, you know, that should matter to everyone who cares about student success and building our workforce for the future.

SUMMERS: We’ve been speaking with Jonathan Johnson. He’s founder and CEO of the Rooted School Foundation. Jonathan, thank you so much.

JOHNSON: Juana, thank you so much for the opportunity.

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