We exploit a rich administrative panel data-set for cohorts of Economics students at a UK university in order to identify causal effects of class absence on student performance. We utilise the panel properties of the data to control for unobserved heterogeneity across students and hence for...

This paper investigates the robustness of recent findings on the effect of parental background on child health. We are particularly concerned with the extent to which their finding that income effects on child health are the result of spurious correlation rather than some causal mechanism. A...

This paper investigates the relationship between attendance at nursery school and children's outcomes in adolescence. In particular, we are interested in child cognitive development at ages 11, 14 and 16, intentions towards tertiary education, economic activity in early adulthood, and in a group...

This paper investigates the relationship between personality traits in adolescence and performance in high school using a large and recent cohort study. In particular, we investigate the impact of locus of control, self-esteem and work ethics at age 15, on test scores at age 16, and on subject...

From individual-level longitudinal data for two entire cohorts of medical students in UK universities, we analyse the probability that an individual student will "drop out" of medical school prior to the successful completion of their studies. We examine the cohort of students enrolling for a...

This paper is concerned with the relationship between class size and the student outcome length of time in post-compulsory schooling. Research on this topic has been problematic partly because omitted unobservables, like parents' incomes and education levels, are likely to be correlated with...

"As in many other countries, government policy in the UK has the objective of raising the participation rate of young people in higher education, while increasing the share of the costs of higher education paid by students themselves. A rationale for the latter element comes from evidence of a...