Attainment data on England's school pupils are more extensive in coverage, detail, quantity, accessibility and of higher quality than monitoring statistics routinely available in other European countries. These data facilitate investigation of low attainment in England's schools and its relationship to ethnicity, gender and poverty. This article…

This paper uses a rich longitudinal dataset to measure the evolution of the gender differences in numeracy among school-age children in Indonesia. Girls outperformed boys by 0.08 standard deviations when the sample was around 11 years old. Seven years later, the gap has widened to 0.19 standard deviations, equivalent to around 18 months of…

This article uses Florida administrative data to evaluate the role that public high schools play in the growing female advantage in college enrollment. We first show evidence of gender sorting across public high schools that is beyond what one would observe if students were randomly assigned to their schools. Using regression and decomposition…

The relationship of education to social mobility, health, and socioeconomic stability is examined in this study. The central question is: how do educational access and attainment reduce poverty and increase social immersion in a system that affords opportunity for quality health care and economic prosperity? An historic perspective, related and…

The authors of this article implement a quasi-experimental strategy to estimate peer effects in economic education by exploiting the institutional setting in a large public university in China, where roommates are randomly assigned conditional on a student's major and province of origin. They found significant impacts of peer academic quality,…

The National Center for Educational Statistics, in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Education, compiles statistical data for U.S. schools. As charts indicate, in 2001, it reported that nationwide, 76% of high-income graduates immediately enroll in colleges or trade schools. However, only 49% of Hispanic and 59% of African Americans enroll…

How many students repeat a grade each year? How do retention rates vary across states and over time? Despite extensive research on the predictors and consequences of grade retention, there is no systematic way to quantify state-level retention rates; even national estimates rely on imperfect proxy measures. We present a conceptually simple…

In January of 2002, President George W. Bush signed into law the "No Child Left Behind Act" of 2001 (NCLB). NCLB, which passed through Congress with overwhelming support from both Republican and Democratic members, was predicated on four basic objectives to address pervasive problems within America's public schools: (1) school…

By incorporating two theoretical frameworks this study examines how school characteristics shape first-grade reading ability-grouping practices, and how this, in turn, affects students' reading achievement. The author uses the data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study and applies the propensity-score method to examine whether first-grade…