IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/deveco/v174y2025ics0304387824001639.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Going the distance: Hybrid vocational training for women in Nepal

Author

Listed:
  • Janzen, Sarah
  • Magnan, Nicholas
  • Mullally, Conner
  • Sharma, Shruti
  • Shrestha, Bhola

Abstract

We test whether access to a hybrid distance learning program can expand professional training opportunities where women’s labor force participation is low. Qualified women were randomly selected to train as community animal health workers through either a traditional training course requiring 35 consecutive days away from home or a distance learning course requiring two shorter stays plus a tablet-based home curriculum. Distance learning increases training completion rates from 30% to 51%. Distance learning trainees are at least as knowledgeable and skilled as their traditionally trained counterparts, with similar labor force participation and long-run job performance.

Suggested Citation

  • Janzen, Sarah & Magnan, Nicholas & Mullally, Conner & Sharma, Shruti & Shrestha, Bhola, 2025. "Going the distance: Hybrid vocational training for women in Nepal," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 174(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:174:y:2025:i:c:s0304387824001639
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103414
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304387824001639
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103414?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David McKenzie, 2017. "How Effective Are Active Labor Market Policies in Developing Countries? A Critical Review of Recent Evidence," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 32(2), pages 127-154.
    2. Thomas Le Barbanchon & Roland Rathelot & Alexandra Roulet, 2021. "Gender Differences in Job Search: Trading off Commute against Wage," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 136(1), pages 381-426.
    3. Eliana Carranza & David McKenzie, 2024. "Job Training and Job Search Assistance Policies in Developing Countries," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 38(1), pages 221-244, Winter.
    4. Dan Goldhaber & Thomas J. Kane & Andrew McEachin & Emily Morton & Tyler Patterson & Douglas O. Staiger, 2023. "The Educational Consequences of Remote and Hybrid Instruction during the Pandemic," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 5(3), pages 377-392, September.
    5. Solène Delecourt & Anne Fitzpatrick, 2021. "Childcare Matters: Female Business Owners and the Baby-Profit Gap," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(7), pages 4455-4474, July.
    6. David McKenzie & Christopher Woodruff, 2014. "What Are We Learning from Business Training and Entrepreneurship Evaluations around the Developing World?," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 29(1), pages 48-82.
    7. Stephen J. Anderson & Pradeep K. Chintagunta & Naufel Vilcassim, 2024. "Virtual Collaboration Technology and International Business Coaching: Examining the Impact on Marketing Strategies and Sales," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 43(3), pages 637-672, May.
    8. Shawn Cole & Mukta Joshiideas & Antoinette Schoar, 2024. "Heuristics on Call: The Impact of Mobile-Phone-Based Business-Management Advice," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 38(3), pages 580-597.
    9. Sitian Liu & Yichen Su, 2024. "The Geography of Jobs and the Gender Wage Gap," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 106(3), pages 872-881, May.
    10. Alessandra Fogli & Raquel Fernandez, 2009. "Culture: An Empirical Investigation of Beliefs, Work, and Fertility," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 1(1), pages 146-177, January.
    11. Berniell, Inés & Berniell, Lucila & Mata, Dolores de la & Edo, María & Marchionni, Mariana, 2021. "Gender gaps in labor informality: The motherhood effect," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    12. Marianne Bertrand & Claudia Goldin & Lawrence F. Katz, 2010. "Dynamics of the Gender Gap for Young Professionals in the Financial and Corporate Sectors," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(3), pages 228-255, July.
    13. Ghada Barsoum & Bruno Crépon & Drew Gardiner & Bastien Michel & William Parienté, 2021. "Evaluating the Impact of Entrepreneurship Edutainment in Egypt: An Experimental Approach," Post-Print hal-04743181, HAL.
    14. Michael S. Kofoed & Lucas Gebhart & Dallas Gilmore & Ryan Moschitto, 2024. "Zooming to Class? Experimental Evidence on College Students' Online Learning during COVID-19," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 6(3), pages 324-340, September.
    15. Guilherme Lichand & Carlos Alberto Doria & Onicio Leal-Neto & João Paulo Cossi Fernandes, 2022. "Publisher Correction: The impacts of remote learning in secondary education during the pandemic in Brazil," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 6(8), pages 1180-1180, August.
    16. Kjetil Bjorvatn & Denise Ferris & Selim Gulesci & Arne Nasgowitz & Vincent Somville & Lore Vandewalle, 2025. "Childcare, Labor Supply, and Business Development: Experimental Evidence from Uganda," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 17(2), pages 75-101, April.
    17. Guido W. Imbens & Charles F. Manski, 2004. "Confidence Intervals for Partially Identified Parameters," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 72(6), pages 1845-1857, November.
    18. Erica Field & Seema Jayachandran & Rohini Pande & Natalia Rigol, 2016. "Friendship at Work: Can Peer Effects Catalyze Female Entrepreneurship?," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 8(2), pages 125-153, May.
    19. Guilherme Lichand & Carlos Alberto Doria & Onicio Leal-Neto & João Paulo Cossi Fernandes, 2022. "The impacts of remote learning in secondary education during the pandemic in Brazil," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 6(8), pages 1079-1086, August.
    20. Kjetil Bjorvatn & Alexander W. Cappelen & Linda Helgesson Sekei & Erik Ø. Sørensen & Bertil Tungodden, 2020. "Teaching Through Television: Experimental Evidence on Entrepreneurship Education in Tanzania," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(6), pages 2308-2325, June.
    21. Chen, Xuan & Flores, Carlos A. & Flores-Lagunes, Alfonso, 2015. "Going Beyond LATE: Bounding Average Treatment Effects of Job Corps Training," IZA Discussion Papers 9511, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    22. Xu, Di & Jaggars, Shanna Smith, 2013. "The impact of online learning on students’ course outcomes: Evidence from a large community and technical college system," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 46-57.
    23. Eric P. Bettinger & Lindsay Fox & Susanna Loeb & Eric S. Taylor, 2017. "Virtual Classrooms: How Online College Courses Affect Student Success," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(9), pages 2855-2875, September.
    24. Claudia Goldin, 2014. "A Grand Gender Convergence: Its Last Chapter," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(4), pages 1091-1119, April.
    25. Jason Acimovic & Chris Parker & David F. Drake & Karthik Balasubramanian, 2022. "Show or Tell? Improving Inventory Support for Agent-Based Businesses at the Base of the Pyramid," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 24(1), pages 664-681, January.
    26. Sarah Janzen & Nicholas Magnan & Sudhindra Sharma & William Thompson, 2018. "Short-Term Impacts of a Pay-It-Forward Livestock Transfer and Training Program in Nepal," AEA Papers and Proceedings, American Economic Association, vol. 108, pages 422-425, May.
    27. Cusolito, Ana P. & Darova, Ornella & McKenzie, David, 2023. "Capacity building as a route to export market expansion: A six-country experiment in the Western Balkans," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    28. Rebecca Jack & Clare Halloran & James Okun & Emily Oster, 2023. "Pandemic Schooling Mode and Student Test Scores: Evidence from US School Districts," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 5(2), pages 173-190, June.
    29. Alicia C. Sasser, 2005. "Gender Differences in Physician Pay: Tradeoffs Between Career and Family," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 40(2).
    30. Reddi Kotha & Balagopal (Bala) Vissa & Yimin Lin & Anne‐Valérie Corboz, 2023. "Do ambitious entrepreneurs benefit more from training?," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(2), pages 549-575, February.
    31. Ghada Barsoum & Bruno Crépon & Drew Gardiner & Bastien Michel & William Parienté, 2021. "Evaluating the Impact of Entrepreneurship Edutainment in Egypt: An Experimental Approach," PSE-Ecole d'économie de Paris (Postprint) hal-04743181, HAL.
    32. David McKenzie, 2021. "Small business training to improve management practices in developing countries: re-assessing the evidence for ‘training doesn’t work’," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 37(2), pages 276-301.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Wang, Chunchao & Wang, Yao & Xiao, Aiping & Zhang, Yaru & Zou, Hang, 2025. "Student development in teacher–student interaction: Evidence from a randomized experiment in online education," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 242(C).
    2. Lafortune, Jeanne & Pugatch, Todd & Tessada, José & Ubfal, Diego, 2024. "Can gamified online training make high school students more entrepreneurial? Experimental evidence from Rwanda," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    3. Josep Amer-Mestre and Agnès Charpin, 2022. "Gender Differences in Early Occupational Choices: Evidence from Medical Specialty Selection," Economics Working Papers EUI ECO 2022/01, European University Institute.
    4. Ivandić, Ria & Lassen, Anne Sophie, 2023. "Gender gaps from labor market shocks," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    5. Adnan, Wifag & Miaari, Sami H., 2018. "Voting patterns and the gender wage gap," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 146(C), pages 222-247.
    6. Ponnusamy, Sundar & Trinh, Trong-Anh, 2025. "The impact of mobile internet on student cognitive performance during COVID: Evidence from Pakistan," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    7. Itzik Fadlon & Frederik Plesner Lyngse & Torben Heien Nielsen, 2022. "Early Career Setbacks and Women’s Career-Family Trade-Off," CEBI working paper series 22-06, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics. The Center for Economic Behavior and Inequality (CEBI).
    8. Ina Ganguli & Ricardo Hausmann & Martina Viarengo, 2021. "Gender Differences in Professional Career Dynamics: New Evidence from a Global Law Firm," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 88(349), pages 105-128, January.
    9. Iqbal,Syedah Aroob & Patrinos,Harry Anthony, 2023. "Learning during the Pandemic : Evidence from Uzbekistan," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10474, The World Bank.
    10. Mathias Allemand & Martina Kirchberger & Sveta Milusheva & Carol Newman & Brent Roberts & Vincent Thorne, 2023. "Conscientiousness and Labor Market Returns: Evidence from a Field Experiment in West Africa," Trinity Economics Papers tep0123, Trinity College Dublin, Department of Economics.
    11. Claudia Olivetti & Barbara Petrongolo, 2016. "The Evolution of Gender Gaps in Industrialized Countries," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 8(1), pages 405-434, October.
    12. Hannah Illing & Johannes Schmieder & Simon Trenkle, 2024. "The Gender Gap in Earnings Losses After Job Displacement," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 22(5), pages 2108-2147.
    13. Borghorst, Malte & Mulalic, Ismir & van Ommeren, Jos, 2024. "Commuting, gender and children," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    14. Jonas Jessen & Lavinia Kinne & Michele Battisti, 2024. "Child Penalties in Labour Market Skills," Berlin School of Economics Discussion Papers 0052, Berlin School of Economics.
    15. Estefanía Galván & Cecilia García‐Peñalosa, 2025. "Interactions among gender norms: Evidence from US couples," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 72(1), February.
    16. Nieto, Adrián, 2021. "Native-immigrant differences in the effect of children on the gender pay gap," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 654-680.
    17. Zoë Cullen & Ricardo Perez-Truglia, 2023. "The Old Boys' Club: Schmoozing and the Gender Gap," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 113(7), pages 1703-1740, July.
    18. Claudia Goldin & Lawrence F. Katz, 2016. "A Most Egalitarian Profession: Pharmacy and the Evolution of a Family-Friendly Occupation," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(3), pages 705-746.
    19. Corekcioglu, Gozde & Francesconi, Marco & Kunze, Astrid, 2024. "Expansions in paid parental leave and mothers’ economic progress," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    20. Nikolay Angelov & Per Johansson & Erica Lindahl, 2016. "Parenthood and the Gender Gap in Pay," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(3), pages 545-579.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:174:y:2025:i:c:s0304387824001639. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/devec .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.