Helping struggling students and benefiting all: Peer effects in primary education

Arbeitspapier

We exploit the randomized evaluation of a remedying education intervention that improved the reading skills of low-performing third grade students in Colombia, to study whether providing educational support to low-achieving students affects the academic performance of their higher-achieving classmates. We find that the test scores of non-treated children in treatment schools increased by 0.108 of a standard deviation compared to similar children in control schools. We interpret the reduced-form effect on higher-achieving students as a spillover effect within treated schools. We then estimate a linear-in-means model of peer effects, finding that a one-standard-deviation increase in peers' contemporaneous achievement increases individual test scores by 0.679 of a standard deviation. We rule out alternative explanations coming from a reduction in class size. We explore several mechanisms, including teachers' effort, students' misbehavior, and peer-to-peer interactions. Our findings show that policies aimed at improving the bottom of the achievement distribution have the potential to generate social-multiplier effects that benefit all.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IDB Working Paper Series ; No. IDB-WP-1338

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Externalities ; Analysis of Education ; Education and Economic Development ; Labor Economics: General
• Subject: Peer effects ; Remedying education

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Berlinski, Samuel G. ; Busso, Matias ; Giannola, Michele
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)
• (where): Washington, DC
• (when): 2022

Further information

• DOI: doi:10.18235/0004268
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:44 AM CET