Raising the Bar: Impacts and Implementation of the New Heights Program for Expectant and Parenting Teens in Washington, dc

The schools and students in the study 
The study schools include 9 of the 11 DC public high schools where New Heights became 
available in fall of 2011. These schools include Ballou High School, Columbia Heights 
Education Campus, Coolidge High School, Dunbar High School, Luke C. Moore High School, 
Roosevelt High school, Washington Metropolitan High School, Wilson High School, and 
Woodson High School. The study sample does not include the two schools in which New 
Heights was available since the early 1990s—Anacostia and Cardozo—because no pre-New 
Heights sample could be identified in the DCPS data. Two other expansion schools (Ballou 
STAY and Roosevelt STAY) are not included in the study because they are alternative night 
programs for credit accumulation and most students enroll for only brief periods. These students 
are otherwise enrolled in Ballou and Roosevelt, two schools in the sample. The appendix 
includes further details on this exclusion. 
The analysis sample includes a treatment group and two comparison groups; a single impact 
of New Heights is calculated using all three groups. Parenting females attending study schools 
from fall 2011 through spring 2015 comprise the treatment group. The first comparison group is 
composed of parenting females attending study schools from fall 2007 through spring 2011. The 
second comparison group consists of nonparenting females in the same schools, over the same 
time periods. The purpose of the second comparison group is to account for other changes that 
took place in DCPS at the same time as the New Heights expansion so that we do not 
misinterpret those other changes as program impacts. Figure III.2 illustrates the treatment and 
comparison groups. 
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We considered measuring a subsequent birth. The prevalence rate of a subsequent births in the DC DOH sample is 
about 10 percent. To produce a statistically significant impact, the New Heights program would have had to nearly 
eliminate subsequent births. 
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RAISING THE BAR: IMPACTS AND IMPLEMENTATION OF THE NEW HEIGHTS PROGRAM