The panel will present empirical evidence regarding the impact of place-based or “Promise” scholarship programs. These programs provide students attending public schools in specific districts a guaranteed scholarship to attend college. Often the only conditions on the scholarship offer are that the student attends and graduates from a local public high school and gains admittance to one of the participating post-secondary educational institutions. Such programs have been growing in number since the Kalamazoo Promise—the first such program—was announced in 2005. Close to 30 such programs are currently granting scholarships, with many more in the planning stages or under consideration. Programs of this type have been hailed by United States Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, among others, as a potential model for reviving public schools and spurring economic revitalization in the nation’s declining central cities. Supporters hope that these programs will have positive impacts in three broad domains: K-12 school culture and student achievement; post-secondary access, persistence, and college completion; and local economic development. This panel will present the results of recent efforts to evaluate the effects of these type of place-based scholarship in each of these domains.