This paper aims to demonstrate the importance of controlling for endogenous peer effects in estimating the influence of gender peer effects on educational outcomes. Using Manski's linear-in-means model, this paper illustrates that the estimation of gender peer effects is potentially biased in the presence of endogenous peer effect in education.…

This paper contributes to the class size literature by analysing whether short-run class size effects are constant across grade levels in compulsory school. Results are based on administrative data on all pupils enrolled in Danish public schools. Identification is based on a government-imposed class size cap that creates exogenous variation in…

In this paper, we explore whether there is a relationship between average grades earned in a course and the national average salaries of graduates of the major associated with the course. Using student-level data from a selective private liberal arts college, we find an inverse relationship. The result suggests that students face a trade-off…

In many transition countries, including Ukraine, decreases in population and fertility have led to substantial falls in the number of school-aged children. As a consequence, these countries now have school networks that consist of many small schools, leading many countries to consider reorganizing their networks by closing smaller schools and…

We analyze class-size effects on academic achievement in secondary school in Denmark exploiting an institutional setting where pupils cannot predict class size prior to enrollment, and where post-enrollment responses aimed at affecting realized class size are unlikely. We identify class-size effects combining a regression discontinuity design with…

This paper analyzes whether class size has an effect on the prevalence of mental health problems and well-being among adolescents in Swedish schools. We use cross-sectional data collected in year 2008 covering 2755 Swedish adolescents in ninth grade from 40 schools and 159 classes. We utilize different econometric approaches to address potential…

In this paper, we analyze class size effects on college students exploiting data from a project offering special remedial courses in mathematics and language skills to freshmen enrolled at an Italian medium-sized public university. To estimate the effects of class size, we exploit the fact that students and teachers are virtually randomly assigned…

This paper uses data from the Norwegian elementary school to test whether students from disadvantaged backgrounds benefit from smaller classes. The data cover one cohort of fourth graders who have been treated in small versus large classes for a period of three years. The Norwegian class size rule of maximum 28 students is used to generate…

Using richly detailed data on fourth- and fifth-grade students in the North Carolina public school system, I find evidence that students are assigned to classrooms in a non-random manner based on observable characteristics for a substantial portion of classrooms. Moreover, I find that this non-random assignment is statistically related to class…

Proponents of class size reductions (CSRs) draw heavily on the results from Project Student/Teacher Achievement Ratio to support their initiatives. Adding to the political appeal of these initiative are reports that minority and economically disadvantaged students received the largest benefits from smaller classes. We extend this research in two…

We analyze the effectiveness of the Programa Hondureno de Educacion Comunitaria (PROHECO) community school program in rural Honduras. The data include standardized tests and extensive information on school, teacher, classroom and community features for 120 rural schools drawn from 15 states. Using academic achievement decompositions we find that…

This paper tests three theories of class size determination: that schools assign better-behaved students, higher quality teachers, or higher-achieving students into larger classes. Furthermore, we estimate how these methodologies differ between public and private schools. Using a nationally representative sample from the USA, we show that, within…

This paper examines the effect of class size on student evaluations of the quality of an introductory mathematics course at Lund University in Sweden. In contrast to much other studies, we find a large negative, and statistically significant, effect of class size on the quality of the course. This result appears to be quite robust, as almost all…

Uses data from the National Child Development Study to estimate the effects of class size. Finds a significant and sizeable association between smaller classes and higher attainment in reading in the early years of schools when using instrumental-variables estimates, with class size instrumented by the interaction between school size and school…

Despite the existence of a considerable and current educational literature concerned with the effect of class size on student achievement, the results of attempts to empirically identify the relationship between the variables class size and student achievement are mixed at best. These attempts have typically been hindered, however, by the…