We study if the combined significant reduction in the pupil-teacher ratio and increase in parental education observed in Italy between the end of IIWW and the end of 1980s had a significant impact on the educational attainment and labor market returns of a representative sample of Italians born...

The 2010 primary school reform in the UK aimed at giving schools more autonomy and freedom from local council's control, by giving them the option to become academies. Once converted, schools need to choose between remaining a standalone academy or joining an academy chain. However, the majority...

This article relies on a large-scale field experiment in Mexico to measure the effects of two ability-grouping models (tracking and heterogeneous/bimodal groups) on student learning outcomes during middle school. Both strategies yielded an average learning gain of 0.08 of a standard deviation....

How much do schools differ in their effectiveness? Recent studies that seek to answer this question account for student sorting using random assignment generated by central allocation mechanisms or oversubscribed schools. However, the resulting estimates, while causal, may also reflect peer...

We examine the effect of single motherhood on children’s secondary school track choice using 12-year-old children drawn from the German Socio-Economic Panel. In line with previous studies for the U.S., the U.K. and Sweden, we find a negative correlation between single motherhood and...

In present day Germany, one in seven children is raised in a single parent household. We investigate the effect of single parenthood on children’s educational attainment, measured by the school track at the age 14, using ordered probit models. We study whether the effect of living in single...

We study the determinants of math achievement among children in early elementary school using data from a unique experiment in which children were randomly assigned to classrooms within schools for four consecutive grades. As a result, each child in our sample was exposed to four separate,...

Low salaries, a limited amount of full-time teaching positions, and alternative systems of allocating teaching hours lead teachers to look for additional jobs in other schools. Although this is a more common phenomenon of teacher labor markets in developing countries, teachers who teach specific...

This paper examines the effects of skill advantages at age six on different types of parental investments, and long-run outcomes up to age 27. We exploit exogenous variation in skills due to school entry rules, combining 20 years of Chilean administrative records with a regression discontinuity...

This paper estimates the effect of home high-speed internet on national test scores of students at age 14. We combine comprehensive information on the telecom network, administrative student records, house prices and local amenities in England in a fuzzy spatial regression discontinuity design...