Dr. C. Kirabo Jackson is Assistant Professor in the Labor Economics Department at the ILR School, Cornell University and is Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University. His research interests span the fields of labor economics, public finance, and applied econometrics, with a focus on the economics of education. Much of his research has focused on the role of teachers in the K-12 system. Specifically, his recent work analyzes the role of peer learning among teachers in determining teacher effectiveness, how student demographics directly affect the distribution of teacher quality across schools, and how policies that reward teachers (and students) for student achievement improve student outcomes. His work has appeared in economics journals such as the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, the Journal of Labor Economics, the Economic Journal, and the Journal of Human Resources, and his research has been featured in numerous news outlets including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Globe and Mail, and USA Today.
Published and Accepted Articles
A Little Now for a Lot Later: A Look at a Texas Advanced Placement Incentive Program, The Journal of Human Resources (2010)
The Texas Advanced Placement Incentive Program pays both students and teachers for passing grades on...
Do Students Benefit From Attending Better Schools?: Evidence From Rule-based Student Assignments in Trinidad and Tobago, The Economic Journal (2010)
In Trinidad and Tobago students are assigned to secondary schools after fifth grade based on...
Teaching Students and Teaching Each Other: The Importance of Peer Learning for Teachers (with Elias Bruegmann), American Economic Journal: Applied Economics (2009)
Using student examination data linked to longitudinal teacher personnel data, we document that a teacher’s...
Student Demographics, Teacher Sorting, and Teacher Quality: Evidence From the End of School Desegregation, The Journal of Labor Economics (2009)
The reshuffling of students due to the end of student busing in Charlotte-Mecklenburg provides a...
Cash for Test Scores: The impact of the Texas Advanced Placement Incentive Program, Education Next (2008)
Working Papers
Match Quality, Worker Productivity, and Worker Mobility: Direct Evidence From Teachers (2010)
I investigate the importance of the match between teachers and schools for student achievement. I...
A Stitch in Time: The Effects of a Novel Incentive-Based High-School Intervention on College Outcomes (2009)
I analyze the longer-run effects of a program that pays both 11th and 12th grade...
One for the Road: Public Transportation, Alcohol Consumption, and Intoxicated Driving (with Emily G. Owens), (2009)
We exploit arguably exogenous train schedule changes in Washington DC to investigate the relationship between...
Peer Quality or Input Quality?: Evidence from Trinidad and Tobago (2009)
Using exogenous secondary school assignments to remove self-selection bias to schools and peers, I obtain...
School Competition and Teacher Quality: Evidence from Charter School Entry in North Carolina (with James Cowan) (2009)
We compare teacher turnover, characteristics, value-added, and salaries at traditional public schools before and after...
Other Papers
Ability-Grouping and Academic Inequality: Evidence From Rule-Based Student Assignments, (2008)
In Trinidad and Tobago students are assigned to secondary schools after fifth grade based on...
Cost Should Be No Barrier: An Evaluation of the First Year of Harvard's Financial Aid Initiative (with Christopher Avery, Caroline Hoxby, Kaitlin Burek, Glenn Poppe, and Mridula Raman), Working Papers (2006)
This paper evaluates the first year of Harvard’s Financial Aid Initiative, which increased aid and...