J-PAL North America News: Research partnerships in Puerto Rico + New results on medical debt relief

The Second International Symposium on Research and Impact in Education, held in Puerto Rico last month, brought together researchers, implementing partners, and community members to share the evidence being generated on innovative education programs in the territory. The event highlighted the Puerto Rico Department of Education (PRDE)’s ongoing partnership with J-PAL North America to build and use evidence to inform education policy and help students learn.

We, Damarys Varela Vélez and Jeannine Ortiz Morales, along with our team, implement the innovative programs in Puerto Rico that are being studied by researchers in the J-PAL network. The school system in our territory has faced many challenges that have affected student learning, and conducting these evaluations has come with its own set of challenges. In the face of these challenges, strong research partnerships to evaluate new programs such as ATEMA—an evaluation on the impact of computer-assisted learning—and ACEmoción—a program that provides social emotional training for teachers—have provided important insights into our educational programs at this critical time.???

This research partnership has succeeded due to constant communication and effective collaboration between the J-PAL team, the implementation team, the researchers, and the embedded research managers at PRDE who directly support these projects and relationships. Working with Spanish-speaking staff at J-PAL North America and researchers who hold a deep understanding of the Puerto Rican context have benefitted these evaluations tremendously. Gustavo Bobonis is Puerto Rican, which provides him with a strong understanding of the culture and social behavior of the government and people of Puerto Rico. Philip Oreopoulos is interested in working to improve the education sector in Puerto Rico and recognizes the unique, unitary system of our schools and the many people committed to excellence at PRDE.??

As a former teacher, I (Damarys) am deeply familiar with the educator experience and bring this perspective to my work supporting evaluations to inform student learning. And I (Jeannine) also have a unique perspective as a former program participant of EDUGESPRO—a project evaluated by J-PAL researchers that supported the professional development of school principals—before joining PRDE’s Institute for Professional Development. The professional learning experience provided a safe place that developed professional learning communities where participants exchanged insights, experiences, and challenges. EDUGESPRO is one of the many innovative programs being evaluated in Puerto Rico that proposes new and creative strategies to improve educational outcomes.

We have a deep appreciation for the relationship that the PRDE has fostered with J-PAL North America over the many years of our partnership. We would also like to recognize the resilience of all teachers, school directors, and staff to support the 240,000 students in our education system. Through this strong partnership, we are generating rigorous evidence and are looking forward to continuing to build a culture of evidence-based policies to improve student outcomes.?

Damarys Varela Vélez | Operations Manager, Institute for Professional Development | Puerto Rico Department of Education

Jeannine Ortiz Morales | Coordinator, Institute for Professional Development | Puerto Rico Department of Education

Read more:

• Event recap: In March, J-PAL North America participated in the Second International Symposium on Research and Impact in Education, hosted by the Forward Society Lab and the Puerto Rico Department of Education (PRDE). Read more about the event >>
• New research results: A new working paper from researchers in the J-PAL network, Raymond Kluender (Harvard) and Neale Mahoney (Stanford), and their co-authors, Francis Wong and Wesley Yin, found that medical debt relief had no impact on the health or financial outcomes measured. Read about the results and the broader policy context in the New York Times >>
• Featured event: On May 23 at 3:00 pm ET, the Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO) will be hosting the next webinar in their "Evidence Matters" series titled Nurturing the Null: Learning from Unexpected Results to Improve Community Outcomes. Register today!

Media mentions:

• New York Times: Paying Off People’s Medical Debt Has Little Impact on Their Lives, Study Finds?
• New York Times: What Researchers Discovered When They Sent 80,000 Fake Résumés to U.S. Jobs?
• Tradeoffs Podcast: 'How Do You Help Patients Who Show Up in the ER 100 Times a Year?'?
• American Economic Association Research Highlights Podcast: Sarah Eichmeyer discusses ways to increase vaccine take-up rates
• The Hill: We’re paying off medical debt wrong