Testing the Water: Drinking Water Quality, Public Notification, and School Outcomes

This is the first paper to estimate the effect of water quality violations on school absences and test scores in the United States. Many common water pollutants have the potential to affect child health. Microorganisms, such as coliform bacteria, pose immediate threats to gastrointestinal health, while other contaminants can cause dizziness, sleepiness, and headaches in the short-term and developmental effects and cancer in the long-term. These health effects may be difficult to observe in traditional health data, such as emergency room visits, which can only capture extreme health episodes. Poor water quality may be more likely to translate into school absences, reduced concentration, or reduced performance during school. Using administrative data on school attendance, water quality violations, and community water supply systems, I quantify the effect of health-based water quality violations on school absences and test scores in North Carolina. Exposure to acute and monthly coliform bacteria violations increases school absences by 7 and 4 percent, respectively. Although both acute and monthly coliform violations worsen school outcomes, only acute violations increase bottled water purchases. Unlike monthly coliform violations, acute violations require immediate 24 hour public notice, which suggests that the method and timing of notification has an important impact on avoidance behaviors.