The Role of Schools in the production of achievement

The estimates for the role of family inputs are in line to previous findings; they foster students achievement and there exists sensitive periods. The estimates of school inputs, contrary to what has been found in the literature, are also important for the formation of students skills. These results are robust to the assumption that savings are not a perfect proxy for students unobserved ability to learn. The estimates of the production function are used to compute counterfactual exercises. In particular, this paper evaluates what would happen if the inputs for black students are reassigned so that their inputs are the actual amount they receive plus the di¤erential that whites students receive. This exercise shows that equalizing home inputs would reduce the achievement gap by 15.4% while equalizing school inputs would do it in 8.7%. If instead inputs are altered only in 12th grade, home and school inputs have similar impact on studentsachievement: school inputs would reduce the gap by 7.4% while home inputs would do it by 7.9%.