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on Education |
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Issue of 2026–04–06
fourteen papers chosen by João Carlos Correia Leitão, Universidade da Beira Interior |
| By: | Frisancho, Veronica (CAF - Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean, Buenos Aires, Argentina); Gallegos, Sebastian (Universidad Adolfo Ibañez); Gonzalez, Constanza (Universidad Adolfo Ibañez) |
| Abstract: | Do second chances at a high-stakes admission exam yield long-term gains? Leveraging fifteen years of Chilean administrative data and an RDD, we examine the causal effects of retaking on educational and labor market trajectories. Narrowly missing a preferred program cutoff triggers a 44% increase in retaking, leading to substantial score gains (0.27 SD) and improved placement and enrollment chances. However, these immediate gains do not persist. Retakers graduate at the same rate and from programs with similar earnings and employability profiles as their counterfactual peers. Our results suggest that retaking serves as a reshuffling mechanism yielding null net welfare gains. |
| Keywords: | high-stakes exams, college admissions, exam retaking, regression discontinuity, Chile, educational trajectories, labor market outcomes, centralized admission systems |
| JEL: | I23 I24 I28 J24 J62 N36 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18467 |
| By: | Stephanie Coffey; Joshua S. Goodman; Amy Ellen Schwartz; Leanna Stiefel; Marcus A. Winters; Yunee H. Yoon |
| Abstract: | Special education serves more than one in seven U.S. students yet its causal impact remains understudied. Using longitudinal data from Massachusetts, Indiana, and Connecticut, we estimate the effect of individualized supports with an event-study design that tracks achievement around initial classification. Students' scores decline prior to placement and rise sharply afterward, yielding a consistent V-shaped pattern. Within three years, achievement is 0.2–0.4σ higher than counterfactual trends imply. Gains are similar across disability categories and subgroups, are not driven by testing accommodations, and remain under conservative assumptions. Individualized supports substantially increase learning productivity. |
| Keywords: | special education, disability, achievement, pre-trends |
| JEL: | I21 I28 H52 J24 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12587 |
| By: | Goulas, Sofoklis (foundry10 & Yale University) |
| Abstract: | This study documents a new fact about educational production: Students’ relative standing in noncognitive skills has lasting effects distinct from absolute skills and achievement. Using administrative data from Greece and quasi-random classroom assignment, I identify the causal impact of comparative noncognitive skills, measured as grade 10 classroom rank in grade 9 unexcused absences. A worse rank has persistent, nonlinear effects. While it lowers achievement for both genders, boys respond by sorting into more competitive tracks and higher-earning degrees, whereas girls shift toward less competitive paths. Gender differences in comparative noncognitive skills explain 37% of the gap in expected post-college salaries. Complementary evidence from a survey experiment shows that comparative behavioral labels systematically shift teachers’ expectations and attribution patterns for otherwise identical students. This suggests that relative-standing effects operate through belief-driven institutional responses. |
| Keywords: | noncognitive skills, ordinal rank, peer effects, STEM, gender gap |
| JEL: | I21 I24 J24 J16 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18471 |
| By: | Stephanie G. Coffey; Joshua Goodman; Amy Ellen Schwartz; Leanna Stiefel; Marcus A. Winters; Yunee H. Yoon |
| Abstract: | Special education serves more than one in seven U.S. students yet its causal impact remains understudied. Using longitudinal data from Massachusetts, Indiana, and Connecticut, we estimate the effect of individualized supports with an event-study design that tracks achievement around initial classification. Students’ scores decline prior to placement and rise sharply afterward, yielding a consistent V-shaped pattern. Within three years, achievement is 0.2–0.4σ higher than counterfactual trends imply. Gains are similar across disability categories and subgroups, are not driven by testing accommodations, and remain under conservative assumptions. Individualized supports substantially increase learning productivity. |
| JEL: | I18 I20 I28 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34998 |
| By: | Rupieper, Li Kathrin Kaja (Leibniz University Hannover); Thomsen, Stephan (Leibniz University of Hannover) |
| Abstract: | Lifelong learning is increasingly recognized as important for individual well-being, but causal evidence on this relationship remains scarce. This paper evaluates the effects of non-formal adult education on life satisfaction by exploiting the substantial expansion of courses at East German Volkshochschulen (VHS) following reunification. Combining individual well-being data from SOEP with administrative VHS data, we use quasi-random variation in individuals’ exposure to courses to identify intention-to-treat effects. Estimation results denote small but significant and robust effects of VHS education on life satisfaction. Calculations of average treatment-on-the-treated effects suggest considerably stronger impacts among actual course participants. We furthermore reveal effect heterogeneity across demographic groups. In contrast to formal education, which is commonly found to raise aspirations, we find no corresponding effect of VHS education. Overall, our findings suggest that non-formal courses and training provide an easily accessible, low-cost means of adaptation in times of transformation. |
| Keywords: | Volkshochschule, adult education, transformation, SOEP, Germany, subjective well-being, natural experiment |
| JEL: | H52 I26 I31 N34 P29 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18474 |
| By: | Nolan G. Pope; Yu Hung Yaow |
| Abstract: | During the COVID-19 pandemic, virtual instruction reduced in-person support that may have helped high school students transition to college. Using national school-level data on FAFSA submissions, ACT participation, and first-year college enrollment, we estimate a difference-in-differences model that exploits cross-school variation in virtual instruction during the 2020/2021 school year. A fully virtual school year reduced FAFSA submissions by 4.2 percentage points, ACT participation by 4.8 percentage points, and first-year college enrollment by 2.5 percentage points. FAFSA submissions partially rebounded after reopening, but ACT participation and college enrollment did not. Effects were substantially larger in disadvantaged schools. |
| JEL: | I20 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34999 |
| By: | Febriady, Ade; Postepska, Agnieszka; Angelini, Viola |
| Abstract: | This study documents substantial heterogeneity in returns to education by childhood poverty status among Indonesian wage workers aged 15-35. Individuals who grew up poor earn only 1.5 percent per additional year of schooling-less than onefourth of the 6.8 percent earned by those who were never poor. We estimate these returns using a control-function approach that exploits conditional heteroskedasticity for identification in the absence of exclusion restrictions. The control-function coefficient is three times larger among the poor, indicating markedly stronger positive selection into schooling in this group: only individuals with exceptionally favorable unobserved characteristics attain higher levels of education. We also present descriptive evidence of lower skill accumulation per year of schooling and more limited access to high-paying jobs among disadvantaged individuals, patterns consistent with lower marginal returns. These findings highlight the limited equalizing role of education, measured here by years of schooling. |
| Keywords: | Returns to Education, Childhood Poverty, Control-Function Approach |
| JEL: | I24 I26 I3 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:1731 |
| By: | Enrico Rubolino; Enrico Rubolino |
| Abstract: | Declining civic engagement increasingly strains welfare state institutions. This paper asks whether civic values can be shaped through early educational investments. I study Tax and School, a large-scale program implemented in Italian primary and secondary schools to promote fiscal and civic responsibility. Exploiting staggered cross-municipality adoption, I find that exposure increases students' intrinsic motivation for rule compliance and reduces antisocial behaviors, particularly in socio-economically disadvantaged contexts. These student-level responses gradually aggregate into community-level outcomes: exposed municipalities later exhibit higher voter turnout and stronger support for redistributive policies. Survey evidence points to belief updating about the value of public goods and the role of government in mitigating inequality as a central mechanism. Counterfactual simulations imply that scaling the program could attenuate the secular decline in voter turnout. |
| Keywords: | civic capital, civic education, tax morale, political participation |
| JEL: | I21 H26 D72 Z13 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12575 |
| By: | Margarita Pavlova |
| Abstract: | I re-evaluate the long-term effects of graduating from college during a recession by focusing on entire business cycle trajectories, as opposed to unemployment at graduation. Using CPS data from 1976-2024, I suggest that the persistent gap in earnings between those graduating during high versus low unemployment chiefly corresponds to the effects of unemployment at graduation on graduates of lower GPA, SAT scores and socio-economic background who enrolled in lower-tier colleges because unemployment was high at the time of their high-school graduation. While the scarring effects of graduating during a recession are large and last for over a decade for these marginal graduates, the scarring effects are smaller than previously thought and fade within three years for student cohorts enrolling in college in a low-unemployment labor market. I also show that adverse labor market conditions beyond the year of college graduation exert a stronger influence on long-term outcomes of graduates than the unemployment rate at graduation. Following unemployment trajectories and accounting for selective enrollment highlights the policyrelevant vulnerability of marginal graduates to recessions. |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cer:papers:wp816 |
| By: | Simon Briole (CEE-M - Centre d'Economie de l'Environnement - Montpellier - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement - Institut Agro Montpellier - Institut Agro - Institut national d'enseignement supérieur pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement - UM - Université de Montpellier); Marc Gurgand (PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - IP Paris - Institut Polytechnique de Paris); Éric Maurin (PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - IP Paris - Institut Polytechnique de Paris); Sandra Mcnally (UNIS - University of Surrey); Jenifer Ruiz-Valenzuela (UB - Universitat de Barcelona); Daniel Santín (UCM - Universidad Complutense de Madrid = Complutense University of Madrid [Madrid]) |
| Abstract: | This paper shows that schools can foster the transmission of civic virtues by helping students to develop concrete, democratically chosen, collective projects. We draw on an RCT implemented in 200 middle schools in three countries. The program leads students to conduct citizenship projects in their communities under the supervision of teachers trained in the intervention. The intervention caused a decline in absenteeism and disciplinary sanctions at school, alongside improved academic achievement. It also led students to diversify their friendship network. The program has stronger effects when implemented by teachers who are initially more involved in the life of the school. |
| Keywords: | citizenship, education, teaching practices, project-based learning, RCT, youth |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05544282 |
| By: | Monica P. Bhatt; Jonathan Guryan; Fatemeh Momeni; Philip Oreopoulos; Eleni Packis |
| Abstract: | This paper presents the results of three field experiments testing interventions designed to increase engagement and improve learning during remote schooling. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the use of remote learning when schooling is interrupted has become more common, prompting educators to ask: How can we better engage students during remote instruction? This is especially salient because much of what we know about student engagement is based on in-person schooling, not virtual instruction. In the first experiment, we find that personalized phone calls increased families’ likelihood of registering for a virtual summer schooling program in Chicago Public Schools, the pre-specified primary outcome. In the second experiment, we find sending weekly text messages had no effect on students’ summer days absent and usage of Khan Academy, the primary outcomes; in analyses of secondary outcomes, we find that the weekly text messages increased students’ likelihood of passing their summer math course. In the third experiment, we find adding an instructional aide to supplement classroom teachers had no effect on the primary outcomes of summer days absent and usage of Khan Academy; in analyses of secondary outcomes, we find beneficial impacts in the following school year on students’ math grades and passing rates. |
| JEL: | I21 I24 J01 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34996 |
| By: | Ueno, Yuko (Hitotsubashi University); Usui, Emiko (Hitotsubashi University) |
| Abstract: | This study investigates gender differences in labor market outcomes among highly educated individuals in Japan, emphasizing heterogeneity by fields of study, with a focus on STEM. Using data from the Japanese Panel Study of Employment Dynamics (JPSED), we find that women with STEM degrees begin their careers with earnings comparable to men with at least a bachelor’s degree in any field; yet the gap widens to 24.4 percent six to ten years after graduation. Penalties are especially large for mothers and remain sizable for childless women. Field differences are stark: six to ten years out, women with STEM bachelor’s degrees, Social Sciences, or Humanities degrees earn less than men with high-school or junior-college education. In contrast, women with STEM advanced degrees or Medicine/Pharmacy degrees earn more than men with a high-school or junior-college education, and women with Medicine/Pharmacy degrees maintain wage parity with men holding at least a bachelor’s degree in any field. These findings indicate that family responsibilities matter, but structural barriers against women also contribute to persistent gender gaps, with holders of advanced degrees in STEM, Medicine, or Pharmacy as notable exceptions. |
| Keywords: | STEM, field of study, female, Japan |
| JEL: | J16 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp18465 |
| By: | Chihiro Inoue; Yusuke Ishihata; Suguru Otani |
| Abstract: | We study marital sorting using a novel dataset from a marriage matching platform, which uniquely records a rich set of pre-marital attributes, including preferences for children and for the division of housework and childcare. Unlike census or post-marital surveys, all characteristics are collected prior to matching and validated using official documents, yielding clean measures of preferences uncontaminated by post-marital coordination. Applying a multidimensional matching framework to twelve attributes, we find strong positive assortative matching across all dimensions. Age is the most salient trait, but preferences for children are the second most important - exceeding education - a pattern largely invisible in standard data. Preference measures play a distinct role in the matching process: they exhibit limited cross-attribute interactions with sociodemographic and anthropometric characteristics, in contrast to the pervasive interactions among those attributes. A low-dimensional factor representation shows that preferences for children constitute a separate and salient margin of sorting. Using the staged structure of the platform, we further show that assortative matching along different dimensions emerges at distinct points in the dating process: sorting by age and income is already present at the initial Application stage, whereas sorting by preferences for children becomes robust only at later stages of relationship formation, reflecting selective continuation rather than sorting at the point of final agreement. A simple theoretical exercise demonstrates that ignoring preference-based sorting and assuming homogeneous preferences across couples leads to biased estimates of policy effects on subsequent household decisions. |
| Date: | 2026–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2603.25372 |
| By: | Douaa Snadrou (UH2C - Université Hassan II de Casablanca = University of Hassan II Casablanca = جامعة الحسن الثاني (ar)); Malika Haoucha (UH2C - Université Hassan II de Casablanca = University of Hassan II Casablanca = جامعة الحسن الثاني (ar)) |
| Abstract: | This article provides an extensive literature review on the topic of branding in Higher Education, along with an exploration of the numerous aspects that influence students' choice of a Higher Education Institution (HEI). Within the competitive higher education landscape, branding has evolved into a vital part of HEI identity, image, and competitiveness, with a considerable impact on student decision-making. This review investigates the main concepts associated with branding and brand image in the educational context, beginning with the general branding concept and progressing to branding applied in this particular field, while taking into account the applicability and challenges of its transposition, before delving into the various perspectives of brand image, notably, the rational and emotional dimensions. By bringing together the existing body of knowledge concerning branding in higher education institutions, this article provides a better understanding of the impact of branding on the educational sector while also offering some insight into the appealing nature of the brand image throughout the students' decision to enroll in a HEI. |
| Keywords: | Higher Education Institutions Brand image Students' Perception Decision-making Process, Higher Education Institutions, Brand image, Students' Perception, Decision-making Process |
| Date: | 2024–03–20 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05511521 |