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I've heard several times that the existence of private or "charter" schools near public schools in the US harms public schools specifically because it draws "stronger"(grade-wise or socioeconomically) students away.

Allegedly having "stronger" peers somehow helps the educational process of the "weaker" students. And building private schools which "cream" (see explanation below) the better students will negatively affect the performance of the students who are left in the public schools.

E.g:

For example, research by Coleman et al. (1966) shows that “the socioeconomic level of a student’s school had more effect on his achievement than any other measurable factor except the socioeconomic level of his home” (Jencks 1973,100).

From QUALITY, RACE, AND THE URBAN EDUCATION MARKETPLACE RECONSIDERED (page 273 (114 in pdf)) are based on this:

Coleman,J. S.,E. Q. Campbell,C. J. Hobson,J. McPartland,A. M. Mood,F. D.Weinfeld,and R. L. York. 1966. Equality of educational opportunity.Washington,DC: Government Printing Office.

Article which has some data but it's almost 50 years old and might be not that relevant.

I was wondering whether there's some (newer?) evidence (statistical or otherwise) to that claim being true (if true, how much effect does it have).

Edit:

An example:

Given public school A that has some "strong" students, if some organization would open a private school B and those "strong" students would be accepted to school B and would be transferred there.

Would the remaining students in school A be affected by the absence of their "stronger" peers or not?

This could maybe checked by comparing public schools with similar population prior to school B's appearance.

When I'm talking about "creaming" I'm talking about the intentional and systematic use of selection criteria to choose which students attend a school (which is usually choosing the "better" students e.g better grades or better test results in some SAT-like test).

Scis
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  • [Welcome to Skeptics!](http://meta.skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1505/welcome-to-new-users). The title uses a term (and mentions a region) which isn't in the body at all. – Oddthinking Aug 23 '14 at 18:27
  • @Oddthinking Thanks for the input. I've tried to clarify. – Scis Aug 23 '14 at 19:08
  • @Clockwork-Muse OK , but there are claims that the mere existence of stronger peers improves students' performance and that's part if the reason "creaming" is allegedly bad. – Scis Aug 24 '14 at 11:13
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    @Scis - perhaps that should be added or stated as another question? That students will be improved with stronger peers? And what about the reverse - would students also be brought down by weaker ones? I have a feeling that such effects would be partially determined by self-selected peer groups, which might mean you end up with similar results anyways... – Clockwork-Muse Aug 24 '14 at 11:27
  • @Clockwork-Muse But I'm more interested in what the question currently asks which is does taking away the stronger kids(to private schools via "creaming") harms the ones who are "left behind"... – Scis Aug 24 '14 at 12:57
  • @Scis - if that's the case, you need to fine tune your title. "Affects performance of students remaining in public school" seems a lot more precise to what you want. – user5341 Aug 24 '14 at 23:20
  • Please provide an example of the exact claim being made, that you want us to examine. This site is for examining the evidence behind claims, not for satisfying your curiosity. – Sklivvz Aug 25 '14 at 20:11
  • @Sklivvz I've provided an example, I hope it's clear. As a side note: I don't recall saying that I wish you to satisfy my curiosity and I don't understand what makes you claim that, please elaborate... – Scis Aug 25 '14 at 20:37
  • I meant an example of the claim. We handle notable claims, of which, by definition, there must be many examples. In other words, who thinks that creaming has an effect, and where do they say so? – Sklivvz Aug 25 '14 at 21:08
  • Also, your example is still not clear. If the good students were to simply relocate elsewhere, would the effect be the same? If so, why are we mentioning private schools at all? If not, then what's missing in your example? *Providing a specific example as a quote is a better alternative to answering all these questions.* – Sklivvz Aug 25 '14 at 21:31
  • I quite support this being a question here- yet I have consternation about the pigeonholing the answer. Having worked on this question significantly, I note that the question often has been not how private schools leech the good students, but how they challenge 1. the public trust and perception; 2. the interest of the educated wealthy, and ultimately 3. the gravitas of public education as a fundamental interest of society. In other words, do private schools in practice punch holes in the social fabric by drawing the interest and funds of the wealthy and educated? It is not just peer students. – Brian M. Hunt Aug 26 '14 at 02:57
  • @Sklivvz I've provided a specific quote from the article that was mentioned, I hope this helps. If not I'll try to further clarify the question. – Scis Aug 26 '14 at 13:39
  • @BrianM.Hunt I agree (and I'm aware) that there are other implications of private schools being present, but I'm trying to understand whether this particular factor plays an important role. – Scis Aug 26 '14 at 13:44
  • @Scis: It's a good point. Perhaps one must first answer whether private schools negatively affect public schools at all. If there are circumstances where they do, one might be better placed to consider why - such as the peer student selection theory. – Brian M. Hunt Aug 26 '14 at 13:56
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    @Scis: I looked at your edit. It still is not an example of the claim you seem to be interested in. We are looking for someone else (or many other people) saying "Taking the best students from a school makes the remaining students suffer academically." – Oddthinking Aug 26 '14 at 15:28

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