Tracking can be more equitable than mixing: peer effects and college attendance
Abstract
Parents and policy makers often wonder whether, and how, the choice between a tracked or a mixed educational system affects the efficiency and equity of national educational outcomes. This paper analyzes this question taking into account their impact on educational results at later stages and two main results are found. First, it shows that tracking can be the efficient system in societies where the opportunity cost of college attendance is high or the pre-school achievement distribution is very dispersed. Second, this paper shows that although conventional wisdom suggests that equality of opportunities is best guaranteed under mixing, this is not necessarily the case. In fact, tracking is the most equitable system for students with intermediate levels of human capital required to attend college..Download Info
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Paper provided by Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Department of Economics in its series Working Papers with number 09.04.Length: 33 pages
Date of creation: Apr 2009
Date of revision: Jul 2012
Handle: RePEc:pab:wpaper:09.04
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Keywords: Peer Effects; Tracking; Mixing; College attendance gap.;Other versions of this item:
- Marisa Hidalgo-Hidalgo, 2010. "Tracking can be more equitable than mixing: Peer effects and college attendance," Working Papers 162, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
- D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
- I28 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Government Policy
- J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:
- NEP-ALL-2009-05-02 (All new papers)
- NEP-EDU-2009-05-02 (Education)
- NEP-LAB-2009-05-02 (Labour Economics)
- NEP-URE-2009-05-02 (Urban & Real Estate Economics)
References
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