The consequences of academic match between students and colleges

Arbeitspapier

We consider the effects of student ability, college quality, and the interaction between the two on academic outcomes and future earnings. Both ability and college quality strongly improve outcomes and earnings. We find little evidence to support the "mismatch" hypothesis that college quality and ability interact in substantively important ways. All students benefit from attending higher quality colleges. Our estimates imply that resorting students to eliminate mismatch, without changing the capacity of any colleges, would raise expected graduation rates by only 0.6 percentage points and mean earnings by $400 per year. The substantial gains for students who move to higher quality colleges under this reshuffling roughly cancel out the losses of students who move down.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Working Paper Series ; No. 5

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Analysis of Education ; Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
• Subject: college quality ; mismatch

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Dillon, Eleanor Wiske ; Smith, Jeffrey A.
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): University of Waterloo, Canadian Labour Economics Forum (CLEF)
• (where): Waterloo
• (when): 2016

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/203336
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:43 AM CET