Likely because of this information, the Department of Justice recently started giving school districts more than $70 million in federal funding to improve school safety. Much of this funding went toward hiring more counselors and training teachers how to identify student mental health problems. But while these federal grants are well‐intended, there may be a better solution.
Our just‐released study uses state‐level data from 49 states and nationally representative student‐level data from 4,353 students to examine the effects of school choice on teen suicides and adult mental health.
After controlling for factors such as demographics and economic output, our state‐level results generally find that the enactments of private and public school choice laws reduce teen suicides.
After controlling for several student and family background characteristics, including a post‐baseline measure of mental health, our student‐level results suggest that private schooling improves mental health in the long‐run.
Specifically, we find that private schooling reduces the likelihood that individuals report a mental health disorder at around 30 years of age by 2.2 percentage points. We also find that that private schooling reduces the number of times these individuals report being seen for mental illnesses. Both of these student‐level effects are moderate in size, as they each translate to around a 14 percent of a standard deviation improvement in mental health.
But why?
Families value the overall health and safety of their children more than anyone else. Private schools must cater to the needs of their customers if they want to remain open. Of course, informed families will not voluntarily send their children to schools that harm them mentally or physically. However, monopoly power allows residentially assigned public schools to remain open whether or not they are safe. Put differently, residential assignment means that public schools have little incentive to provide the safest educational experience possible.
But that’s not all. Residential assignment and government regulations also make it as difficult as possible for leaders to create strong school cultures and missions.
Physical danger, bullying, disorder, drugs, and restrictions on student liberty could all lead to various long‐term mental health issues. The preponderance of the scientific evidence on the subject indicates that private school choice decreases the chances of each of these problems occurring at schools.
Of course, much more research is needed on this topic. Our study is the first evaluation linking school choice policies to mental health issues. But our results, and basic economic theory, suggest that school choice could address the roots of the student mental health problem.