Fertile Soil? How Information Does (and Does Not) Shape Attitudes toward School Choice in Rural America

This descriptive work by M. Danish Shakeel and Michael Henderson explores attitudes toward charter schools in rural America. The authors examine whether support for charter schools in rural areas lags behind support for charters in urban and suburban areas, and whether the presence of such a lag is caused by differences in local school quality or lack of familiarity with charter schools. They find that parents in rural areas are less supportive of charter schools, even once demographic and political differences are controlled for. Moreover, this difference is evident even when parents have exposure to charter schools and when accounting for local school quality.