The role of family educational context in modulating the effects of educational policies – The case of social promotion of primary school students in Côte d’Ivoire

This paper provides an empirical contribution to the literature the role of family educational contexts in low- and middle-income countries. It examines how the family educational context modulates the effects of educational policies such as social promotion. Our study is based on a sample of 3118 final-year primary students drawn from 150 public schools, using data from the 2019 PASEC survey. The quality of the family educational context is measured through a composite proxy that captures the educational, cultural, and social capital within the household. The results show that more than 60 % of students benefit from only two or three favorable dimensions of this context simultaneously. Using quasi-experimental methods (PSM and IPWRA), we find that social promotion has an average negative effect on students’performance in reading and mathematics. Paradoxically, this effect is more pronounced for students from favorable family educational contexts. Two complementary mechanisms are discussed: a decline in motivation among students, parents, and teachers due to the absence of evaluative pressure, and teachers’ unconscious tendency to focus attention on struggling students, leading to a priori categorization of those perceived as at risk of failure. These findings highlight the need to integrate students’ learning environments into the design of educational policies. We recommend aligning social promotion with targeted pedagogical supports (tutoring, individualized assistance), while explicitly considering the family context in support strategies. This approach would enable the development of differentiated interventions tailored to students’ specific needs, thereby enhancing the effectiveness of educational policies.