Shushanik Margaryan

This paper examines an early childhood, income-based affirmative action policy that al-locates school admission points to children from low-income households based on twoincome thresholds. These thresholds create sharp discontinuities that we exploit using aregression discontinuity design. Our analysis draws on the universe of school applicationssubmitted at age three, linked to academic and well-being outcomes nine years later. We findthat the affirmative action policy increases both the number and quality of feasible schooloptions available to low-income families and raises the likelihood of admission to their top-choice schools. However, treated families do not systematically rank higher–value-addedschools or those with better average test scores as their top choices. Instead, the policyshifts admissions toward charter schools with slightly higher socioeconomic composition.Nine years after application, we find no significant effects on standardized test scores orstudent well-being.These findings suggest that early childhood affirmative action broadenseducational options for low-income families but has limited long-term impacts.