IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/49716.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Compulsory tutorial programmes and performance in undergraduate microeconomics: A regression discontinuity design

Author

Listed:
  • Schöer, Volker
  • Shepherd, Debra

Abstract

As South African universities experience extremely low graduation rates, academic staff implement a range of interventions, for instance tutorial programmes, in order to improve student performance. However, relatively little is known about the impact of such tutorial programmes on students’ performance. Using data from an introductory microeconomics course, this paper investigates the impact of a compulsory tutorial programme on students’ performance in their final examination. Due to the fact that the tutorial programme was only compulsory for students that obtained less than a pass in the first test, while otherwise offered on a voluntary basis, this paper employs a fuzzy RD design to investigate the impact of the tutorial programme on final exam performance. Findings indicate that assignment to the compulsory programme positively affects students’ performance. However, this result is mainly driven by students who already seem to have the ability to perform but, for whatever reason, underperformed in the first test. Thus, while assignment to the tutorial programme itself leads to an improvement in performance, the mechanism is unclear.

Suggested Citation

  • Schöer, Volker & Shepherd, Debra, 2013. "Compulsory tutorial programmes and performance in undergraduate microeconomics: A regression discontinuity design," MPRA Paper 49716, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:49716
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/49716/1/MPRA_paper_49716.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David S. Lee & Thomas Lemieux, 2010. "Regression Discontinuity Designs in Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(2), pages 281-355, June.
    2. Imbens, Guido W. & Lemieux, Thomas, 2008. "Regression discontinuity designs: A guide to practice," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 615-635, February.
    3. Vincent G. Munley & Eoghan Garvey & Michael J. McConnell, 2010. "The Effectiveness of Peer Tutoring on Student Achievement at the University Level," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 277-282, May.
    4. McCrary, Justin, 2008. "Manipulation of the running variable in the regression discontinuity design: A density test," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 698-714, February.
    5. Guido Imbens & Karthik Kalyanaraman, 2012. "Optimal Bandwidth Choice for the Regression Discontinuity Estimator," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(3), pages 933-959.
    6. Hahn, Jinyong & Todd, Petra & Van der Klaauw, Wilbert, 2001. "Identification and Estimation of Treatment Effects with a Regression-Discontinuity Design," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(1), pages 201-209, January.
    7. Heckman, James J. & Robb, Richard Jr., 1985. "Alternative methods for evaluating the impact of interventions : An overview," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 30(1-2), pages 239-267.
    8. Imbens, Guido W & Angrist, Joshua D, 1994. "Identification and Estimation of Local Average Treatment Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 62(2), pages 467-475, March.
    9. Wilbert van der Klaauw, 2002. "Estimating the Effect of Financial Aid Offers on College Enrollment: A Regression-Discontinuity Approach," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 43(4), pages 1249-1287, November.
    10. Lee, David S., 2008. "Randomized experiments from non-random selection in U.S. House elections," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 675-697, February.
    11. Pm Horn & Ai Jansen, 2009. "An Investigation Into The Impact Of Tutorials On The Performance Of Economics Students," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 77(1), pages 179-189, March.
    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. Blaise Melly & Rafael Lalive, 2020. "Estimation, Inference, and Interpretation in the Regression Discontinuity Design," Diskussionsschriften dp2016, Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft.
    2. Porter, Jack & Yu, Ping, 2015. "Regression discontinuity designs with unknown discontinuity points: Testing and estimation," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 189(1), pages 132-147.
    3. Vergolini, Loris & Zanini, Nadir, 2015. "Away, but not too far from home. The effects of financial aid on university enrolment decisions," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 91-109.
    4. Guido W. Imbens & Jeffrey M. Wooldridge, 2009. "Recent Developments in the Econometrics of Program Evaluation," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(1), pages 5-86, March.
    5. Mauricio Villamizar‐Villegas & Freddy A. Pinzon‐Puerto & Maria Alejandra Ruiz‐Sanchez, 2022. "A comprehensive history of regression discontinuity designs: An empirical survey of the last 60 years," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(4), pages 1130-1178, September.
    6. Loris Vergolini & Nadir Zanini, 2012. "How does aid matter? The effect of financial aid on university enrolment decisions," Working Papers 2012/7, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    7. Montoya, Ana Maria & Noton, Carlos & Solis, Alex, 2018. "The Returns to College Choice: Loans, Scholarships and Labor Outcomes," Working Paper Series 2018:12, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    8. Susan Athey & Guido W. Imbens, 2017. "The State of Applied Econometrics: Causality and Policy Evaluation," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 31(2), pages 3-32, Spring.
    9. Yoichi Arai & Yu‐Chin Hsu & Toru Kitagawa & Ismael Mourifié & Yuanyuan Wan, 2022. "Testing identifying assumptions in fuzzy regression discontinuity designs," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 13(1), pages 1-28, January.
    10. Steven F. Koch & Jeffrey S. Racine, 2016. "Healthcare facility choice and user fee abolition: regression discontinuity in a multinomial choice setting," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 179(4), pages 927-950, October.
    11. Jiang, Wei & Lu, Yi & Xie, Huihua, 2020. "Education and mental health: Evidence and mechanisms," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 180(C), pages 407-437.
    12. Jin-young Choi & Myoung-jae Lee, 2017. "Regression discontinuity: review with extensions," Statistical Papers, Springer, vol. 58(4), pages 1217-1246, December.
    13. Perez-Reyna, David & Villamizar-Villegas, Mauricio, 2019. "Exchange rate effects of financial regulations," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 228-245.
    14. Abou-Chadi, Tarik & Krause, Werner, 2020. "The Causal Effect of Radical Right Success on Mainstream Parties’ Policy Positions: A Regression Discontinuity Approach," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 50(3), pages 829-847.
    15. Solé-Ollé, Albert & Viladecans-Marsal, Elisabet, 2013. "Do political parties matter for local land use policies?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 42-56.
    16. Alex Solis, 2017. "Credit Access and College Enrollment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 125(2), pages 562-622.
    17. Qin, Xuezheng & Zhuang, Castiel Chen & Yang, Rudai, 2017. "Does the one-child policy improve children's human capital in urban China? A regression discontinuity design," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 287-303.
    18. Loris Vergolini & Nadir Zanini, 2012. "How does aid matter? The effect of financial aid on university enrolment decisions," Working Papers 2012/7, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    19. Guido Imbens & Stefan Wager, 2019. "Optimized Regression Discontinuity Designs," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 101(2), pages 264-278, May.
    20. Dong, Yingying, 2010. "Jumpy or Kinky? Regression Discontinuity without the Discontinuity," MPRA Paper 25461, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Peer tutoring; compulsory tutorial programme; introductory microeconomics; regression discontinuity design; South Africa;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A2 - General Economics and Teaching - - Economic Education and Teaching of Economics
    • A20 - General Economics and Teaching - - Economic Education and Teaching of Economics - - - General
    • A22 - General Economics and Teaching - - Economic Education and Teaching of Economics - - - Undergraduate

    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:pra:mprapa:49716. 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: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.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.