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on Education |
| By: | Naveen Kumar |
| Abstract: | I exploit a natural experiment in education policy in India to examine the effects of creating high-quality public schools. The "model" schools program established schools that admit students through an entrance exam. I estimate the effect of model schools on educational outcomes using a fuzzy Regression Discontinuity Design based upon the entrance exam cutoffs. With a data set of over 63,000 students, I consider three dimensions: (i) academic achievement; (ii) educational attainment; and (iii) career choice. For academic achievement outcomes, attending a model school increases test scores in math by 0.38 standard deviations, in science by 0.26 sd, and in social science by 0.26 sd on average. Attending a model school also increases the probability of obtaining an A in tenth-grade by 20 percentage points. For educational attainment indicators, model schools increase the probability of joining pre-university by 11.5 percentage points. However, attending a model school has no effect on the choice of major in pre-university college. Furthermore, I estimate multiple local average treatment effects and find that model schools have a similar positive effect for students across the ability distribution. Lastly, the per-pupil expenditure in model schools is comparable to that of traditional public schools. Overall, this paper provides suggestive evidence that the quality of public schools can be raised but other barriers persist. |
| JEL: | H52 I21 I24 I28 |
| Date: | 2019–11–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jmp:jm2019:pku634&r=all |
| By: | Franziska Hampf |
| Abstract: | Based on high-quality skill data from PIAAC, this paper provides evidence on the effect of schooling on labor-market relevant cognitive skills. For identification, I exploit the staggered introduction of a compulsory ninth grade in basic track schools across German states, as well as a simultaneous reform that introduced short school years to harmonize the start of the school year nation-wide. Instrumental-variable results suggest that the additional year of compulsory schooling increased numeracy skills of basic-track students by about 0.2 standard deviations. Using superior skill data, the results contrast with previous evidence of zero skill effects of compulsory schooling in Germany |
| Keywords: | Returns to education, compulsory schooling reform, skills, PIAAC |
| JEL: | I21 I24 C26 |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ifowps:_313&r=all |
| By: | Duque, Valentina |
| Abstract: | This paper exploits the sharp escalation of violence in Colombia in the 1980s associated with the emergence of drug cartels to provide novel evidence on the long-run effects of violence exposure throughout the life-course, on children’s educational attainment and academic achievement, using administrative data. I find that, a higher homicide rate in early-childhood is associated with a higher probability of school dropout and conditional on completing high school, lower scores on a national end-of-high school exam. Results are robust to several falsification tests, analyses of potential sources of selection bias, and to controlling for family fixed effects. I provide suggestive evidence that changes in fetal, child, and adolescent health outcomes are important potential mechanisms. |
| Keywords: | Education, Human capital formation, Early-life shocks, Violence, Parental investments |
| Date: | 2019–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:syd:wpaper:2019-16&r=all |