IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp11373.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Do Private Schools Manage Better?

Author

Listed:
  • Bryson, Alex

    (University College London)

  • Green, Francis

    (Institute of Education, University of London)

Abstract

There is a perception among some commentators and policy analysts that leadership and managerial practices in private schools are superior to those in state schools. Analysing a survey of workplaces in Britain, we find little evidence to support this contention when examining the prevalence of modern human resource management (HRM) practices in schools. Rather, the evidence points to greater use of such practices in state schools. Those practices are correlated with improved school performance in the state sector, but not in the private sector. We discuss the implications of these findings for the policy of encouraging managers of private schools to sponsor state schools.

Suggested Citation

  • Bryson, Alex & Green, Francis, 2018. "Do Private Schools Manage Better?," IZA Discussion Papers 11373, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
  • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp11373
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp11373.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bryson, Alex & Stokes, Lucy & Wilkinson, David, 2018. "Can HRM Improve Schools' Performance?," IZA Discussion Papers 11348, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Hanushek, Eric A. & Link, Susanne & Woessmann, Ludger, 2013. "Does school autonomy make sense everywhere? Panel estimates from PISA," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 212-232.
    3. Eyles, Andrew & Hupkau, Claudia & Machin, Stephen, 2016. "School reforms and pupil performance," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 9-19.
    4. Claire Crawford & Paul Gregg & Lindsey Macmillan & Anna Vignoles & Gill Wyness, 2016. "Higher education, career opportunities, and intergenerational inequality," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 32(4), pages 553-575.
    5. Nicholas Bloom & Renata Lemos & Raffaella Sadun & John Van Reenen, 2015. "Does Management Matter in schools?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0(584), pages 647-674, May.
    6. Francis Green & Stephen Machin & Richard Murphy & Yu Zhu, 2012. "The Changing Economic Advantage from Private Schools," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 79(316), pages 658-679, October.
    7. Lorraine Dearden & Javier Ferri & Costas Meghir, 2002. "The Effect Of School Quality On Educational Attainment And Wages," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 84(1), pages 1-20, February.
    8. Chad Syverson, 2011. "What Determines Productivity?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 49(2), pages 326-365, June.
    9. Roland G. Fryer, Jr., 2014. "Injecting Charter School Best Practices into Traditional Public Schools: Evidence from Field Experiments," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(3), pages 1355-1407.
    10. Bhagat, Sanjai & Bolton, Brian, 2008. "Corporate governance and firm performance," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 257-273, June.
    11. Roland G. Fryer, Jr, 2017. "Management and Student Achievement: Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment," NBER Working Papers 23437, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Thomas Ahn & Jacob Vigdor, 2014. "The Impact of No Child Left Behind's Accountability Sanctions on School Performance: Regression Discontinuity Evidence from North Carolina," NBER Working Papers 20511, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Stephen Machin, 1995. "Plant Closures and Unionization in British Establishments," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 33(1), pages 55-68, March.
    14. Tavares, Priscilla Albuquerque, 2015. "The impact of school management practices on educational performance: Evidence from public schools in São Paulo," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 1-15.
    15. White, Michael & Bryson, Alex, 2013. "Positive employee attitudes: how much human resource management do you need?," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 51167, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Michael White & Alex Bryson, 2018. "HPWS in the Public Sector: Are There Mutual Gains?," DoQSS Working Papers 18-10, Quantitative Social Science - UCL Social Research Institute, University College London.
    2. Martins, Pedro S., 2022. "The wage effects of employers' associations: A case study of the private schools sector," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1163, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    3. Esther Pagán-Castaño & Javier Sánchez-García & Fernando J. Garrigos-Simon & María Guijarro-García, 2021. "The Influence of Management on Teacher Well-Being and the Development of Sustainable Schools," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(5), pages 1-23, March.

    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. Alex Bryson & Lucy Stokes & David Wilkinson, 2020. "Can Human Resource Management Improve Schools' Performance?," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 34(4), pages 427-440, December.
    2. Anand, Gautam & Atluri, Aishwarya & Crawfurd, Lee & Pugatch, Todd & Sheth, Ketki, 2023. "Improving school management in low and middle income countries: A systematic review," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    3. Lee Crawfurd, 2017. "School Management and Public–Private Partnerships in Uganda," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 26(5), pages 539-560.
    4. Sun, Yucheng & Zhou, Xianbo, 2022. "The effect of teacher's concurrent administrative position on students' academic outcomes: Evidence and mechanisms," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 71(C).
    5. Jake Anders & Francis Green & Morag Henderson & Golo Henseke, 2020. "Determinants of private school participation: all about the money?," CEPEO Working Paper Series 20-06, UCL Centre for Education Policy and Equalising Opportunities, revised Feb 2020.
    6. Di Liberto, Adriana & Giua, Ludovica & Schivardi, Fabiano & Sideri, Marco & Sulis, Giovanni, 2023. "Managerial Practices and Student Performance: Evidence from Changes in School Principals," IZA Discussion Papers 16203, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Leaver,Clare & Lemos,Renata Freitas & Dillenburg Scur,Daniela, 2019. "Measuring and Explaining Management in Schools : New Approaches Using Public Data," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9053, The World Bank.
    8. Romero, Mauricio & Bedoya, Juan & Yanez-Pagans, Monica & Silveyra, Marcela & de Hoyos, Rafael, 2022. "Direct vs indirect management training: Experimental evidence from schools in Mexico," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    9. Roland G. Fryer, Jr & Meghan Howard Noveck, 2017. "High-Dosage Tutoring and Reading Achievement: Evidence from New York City," NBER Working Papers 23792, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Sandra McNally & Luis Schmidt & Anna Valero, 2024. "Do management practices matter in further education?," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 91(363), pages 740-769, July.
    11. Nicholas Bloom & Renata Lemos & Raffaella Sadun & Daniela Scur & John Van Reenen, 2014. "The New Empirical Economics of Management," NBER Working Papers 20102, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. John Forth & Alex Bryson, 2019. "Management practices and SME performance," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 66(4), pages 527-558, September.
    13. Gabrielle Wills & Servaas van der Berg, 2018. "Measuring leadership and management and their linkages with literacy in rural and township primary schools in South Africa," Working Papers 21/2018, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.
    14. Nicholas Bloom & Renata Lemos & Raffaella Sadun & John Van Reenen, 2015. "Does Management Matter in schools?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0(584), pages 647-674, May.
    15. Foliano, Francesca & Green, Francis & Sartarelli, Marcello, 2019. "Away from home, better at school. The case of a British boarding school," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    16. Aparicio, Juan & Ortiz, Lidia & Santín, Daniel, 2021. "Comparing group performance over time through the Luenberger productivity indicator: An application to school ownership in European countries," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 294(2), pages 651-672.
    17. Ludger Woessmann, 2016. "The Importance of School Systems: Evidence from International Differences in Student Achievement," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 30(3), pages 3-32, Summer.
    18. Huang, Wei & Li, Teng & Pan, Yinghao & Ren, Jinyang, 2023. "Teacher characteristics and student performance: Evidence from random teacher-student assignments in China," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 214(C), pages 747-781.
    19. Joe Regan-Stansfield, 2016. "Do good primary schools perform even better as academies?," Working Papers 141167564, Lancaster University Management School, Economics Department.
    20. John Forth & Alex Bryson, 2018. "The impact of management practices on SME performance," DoQSS Working Papers 18-04, Quantitative Social Science - UCL Social Research Institute, University College London.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    school performance; human resource management;

    JEL classification:

    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:iza:izadps:dp11373. 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: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    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.