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How Home Exams and Peers Affect College Grades in Unprecedented Times

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  • Tinna Laufey Ásgeirsdottir
  • Marco Francesconi
  • Ásthildur M. Johannsdottir
  • Gylfi Zoega

Abstract

Leveraging administrative data from the University of Iceland, which cover more than 60% of the undergraduate population in the country, we examine how home exams and peer networks shape grades around the COVID-19 crisis. Using difference-in-difference models with a rich set of fixed effects, we find that home exams taken during university closures raised grades by about 0.5 points (approximately 7%) relative to invigilated in-person exams outside the pandemic period. Access to a larger share of high-school peers leads to an average grade increase of up to two-fifths of a point, and exposure to higher-quality peers yielded additional, but smaller gains. Interactions between peer-network measures and the COVID/home-exam indicators are near zero, providing no evidence that peer networks amplified home-exam gains during the pandemic.

Suggested Citation

  • Tinna Laufey Ásgeirsdottir & Marco Francesconi & Ásthildur M. Johannsdottir & Gylfi Zoega, 2025. "How Home Exams and Peers Affect College Grades in Unprecedented Times," CESifo Working Paper Series 12367, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12367
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    Keywords

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    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I23 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Higher Education; Research Institutions
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • D85 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Network Formation
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination

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