Results of a recently-released study led by Paul E. Peterson -- director of the Program on Education Policy and Governance (PEPG) at Harvard University -- indicate that African-American students who used vouchers to attend private schools significantly boosted their mathematics and reading skills within two years, an astonishing achievement.

The problem, according to Mathematica Policy Research -- the group which compiled data in New York schools for Peterson -- is those gains don't show up in the data collected by Mathematica, the New York Times reports.

The Princeton, N.J.-based group went so far as to go public with its concerns, stating they found no significant difference in academic performance between New York public and private school students, and they believe Peterson's claims may be influenced by his previous support for school vouchers.

The "School Choice in New York City After Two Years" study (which requires the free Adobe Acrobat Reader software to view) measured the test scores of 1,400 low-income students in Dayton, Ohio, New York City and Washington, D.C. who used vouchers worth up to $1,700 a year to attend private schools. After two years, African-American students were found to have improved their test scores 6.3 percent compared to their public school counterparts.

The problem, Mathematica states, is that most of the gains were recorded by the Washington students, who showed twice the gains of the New York students and somewhat more improvement than the Dayton schoolchildren, the Times reports.

Mathematica released a statement saying "students who were offered scholarships to attend private schools as part of one of the nation’s largest private voucher programs performed about the same on standardized reading and mathematics tests as students who were not offered scholarships." Mathematica also said Peterson's conclusions were "premature."

Peterson defended his conclusions about academic performance, however, saying "An average is an average."

David Myers, a principle investigator for Mathematica, added that since the study found improvements only by sixth graders -– no students in grades 3, 4 0r 5 showed any gain in scores -– people need to be cautious about basing policy decisions on Peterson's claims, the Times reports.

A group of academics is asking to examine the data -- the study itself has yet to be peer reviewed -- to see if Peterson adjusted for differences in parent education levels and family incomes, the newspaper reports.

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