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on Education |
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Issue of 2009‒09‒19
eight papers chosen by Joao Carlos Correia Leitao Polytechnic Institute of Portalegre and Technical University of Lisbon |
| By: | Richard Buddin; Gema Zamarro |
| Abstract: | This research examines whether teacher licensure test scores and other teacher qualifications affect high school student achievement. The results are based on longitudinal student-level data from Los Angeles. The achievement analysis uses a value-added approach that adjusts for both student and teacher fixed effects. The results show little relationship between traditional measures of teacher quality (e.g., experience and education level) and student achievement in English Language Arts (ELA) or math. Similarly, teacher aptitude and subject-matter knowledge, as measured on state licensure tests, have no significant effects on student achievement. Achievement outcomes differ substantially from teacher to teacher, however, and the effects of a good ELA or math teacher spillover from one subject to the other. |
| Keywords: | Teacher quality, teacher licensure, student achievement, high school, two-level fixed effects, education production function |
| JEL: | J44 J45 H0 H75 I21 |
| Date: | 2009–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ran:wpaper:693&r=edu |
| By: | Mauro Sylos Labini; Natalia Zinovyeva |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates whether the quality of higher education and, in particular, its research performance stimulate graduates' research-oriented careers. More specifically, exploiting a very rich data-set on university graduates and the higher education institutions they attended, we empirically study whether graduates from universities and programs that display better academic research records are more likely to be enroled in PhDs or employed as researchers three years after graduation. Controlling for a number of individual and university covariates and using different proxies for research performance, we find that the likelihood of entering a research-oriented career increases with the quality of academic research. Notably, the inclusion of university fixed-effects shows that this result does not stem from unobserved university heterogeneity. Our finding is stronger for graduates in science, medicine, and engineering. |
| Keywords: | academic research, labor market for scientist, post-graduate education |
| JEL: | I23 O30 O38 |
| Date: | 2009–09–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ssa:lemwps:2009/12&r=edu |
| By: | Newhouse, David; Suryadarma, Daniel |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the relationship between the type of senior high school attended by Indonesian youth and their subsequent labor market outcomes. This topic is very timely, given the government’s recent decision to dramatically expand vocational enrollment. The analysis controls for an unusually rich set of predetermined characteristics, and exploits longitudinal data spanning 14 years to separately identify cohort and age effects. There are four main findings. First, students are sorted into different school types largely on the basis of their entering exam score. Public schools attract the highest-scoring students, while private vocational schools serve the lowest-scoring students. Second, after controlling for a variety of characteristics, including test scores, male public school graduates earn a substantial premium over their privately schooled counterparts. Third, private vocational school graduates fare at least as well as private general graduates, despite coming from more disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds. Finally, the returns to public vocational education have declined sharply for the most recent cohort of men. This raises important concerns about the current expansion of public vocational education, and the relevance of the male vocational curriculum in an increasingly service-oriented economy. |
| Keywords: | Tertiary Education,Secondary Education,Education For All,Labor Markets,Teaching and Learning |
| Date: | 2009–09–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:5035&r=edu |
| By: | Bernardino, Pedro; Marques, Rui |
| Abstract: | The academic rankings are a controversial subject in higher education. However, despite all the criticism, academic rankings are here to stay and more and more different stakeholders use rankings to obtain information about the institutions’ performance. The two most well-known rankings, The Times and the Shanghai Jiao Tong University rankings have different methodologies. The Times ranking is based on peer review, whereas the Shanghai ranking has only quantitative indicators and is mainly based on research outputs. In Germany, the CHE ranking uses a different methodology from the traditional rankings, allowing the users to choose criteria and weights. The Portuguese higher education institutions are performing below their European peers, and the Government believes that an academic ranking could improve both performance and competitiveness between institutions. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the advantages and problems of academic rankings and provide guidance to a new Portuguese ranking. |
| Keywords: | Academic rankings; CHE; higher education; performance evaluation; Portugal; Shanghai; THES |
| JEL: | I2 I23 |
| Date: | 2009–08–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:17297&r=edu |
| By: | Chiara Pronzato |
| Abstract: | More educated parents are observed to have better educated children. From a policy point of view, however, it is important to distinguish between causation and selection. Previous research trying to control for unobserved heterogeneity has found conflicting results: in most cases, a strong positive paternal effect was found with a negligible maternal effect; in fewer cases, opposite results were found. In this paper, I make use of a sample of Norwegian twins to evaluate the impact on the robustness of the estimates when varying the sample size and when selecting different parts of the population. Results concerning the effect of mother’s education are very sensitive to the size of the sample, while the part of the educational distribution considered seems to be a key to reconciling previous results from the literature. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational transmission, education, twin-estimator, sibling-estimator, power of the test |
| JEL: | C23 I2 |
| Date: | 2009–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpc:wplist:wp20_09&r=edu |
| By: | Philip Oreopoulos; Kjell G. Salvanes |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the many avenues by which schooling affects lifetime well-being. Experiences and skills acquired in school reverberate throughout life, not just through higher earnings. Schooling also affects the degree one enjoys work and the likelihood of being unemployed. It leads individuals to make better decisions about health, marriage, and parenting. It also improves patience, making individuals more goal-oriented and less likely to engage in risky behavior. Schooling improves trust and social interaction, and may offer substantial consumption value to some students. We discuss various mechanisms to explain how these relationships may occur independent of wealth effects, and present evidence that non-pecuniary returns to schooling are at least as large as pecuniary ones. Ironically, one explanation why some early school leavers miss out on these high returns is that they lack the very same decision making skills that more schooling would help improve. |
| JEL: | I20 J24 |
| Date: | 2009–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:15339&r=edu |
| By: | Gartell, Marie (Institute for Futures Studies) |
| Abstract: | The ranking of colleges varies both across methods and model specifications. Still, earnings equations tend to be consistent with regard to which colleges that on average are found in the top and bottom half of the earnings distribution. Moreover, there are no systematic differences in the ranking of colleges dependent on the age of the college, i.e. old versus new colleges. Although ranking by earnings equations provide some information about the relation to earnings, endogeneity issues preclude any causal interpretation of the rankings presented here. |
| Keywords: | University education; college chocie; ranking |
| JEL: | I21 J16 J24 J31 J44 |
| Date: | 2009–09–21 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:ifauwp:2009_019&r=edu |
| By: | Jean-Luc De Meulemeester (Centre Emile Bernheim, Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels and DULBEA, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels.) |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we summarize the long run (institutional) evolution of universities in order to identify key models (ideal-types) and the implied motivations of actors. We analyze the university as a medieval guild, its takeover by the State and its decline; we then focus on the emergence of an open model of scientific inquiry. We show how the Humboldtian model emerging in the early 19th century can be viewed as a synthesis of prior developments. We show its diffusion around the world and after the WW2 its problems in an age of massive expansion of higher education and increased economic pressures. We show that the today movement of academic reforms was at the same time unavoidable but marking a clear rupture with the earlier developments. From autonomy and self-regulation, academic institutions become tools of economic and social policies steered from outside – with clear (negative) effects on the motivation of at least the older generation of academics believing in the old academic (Humboldtian) ethos. |
| JEL: | I23 N30 |
| Date: | 2009–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sol:wpaper:09-033&r=edu |