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Peers and Achievement in England's Secondary Schools

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  • Steve Gibbons
  • Shqiponja Telhaj

Abstract

The belief that children thrive if educated amongst higher-achieving schoolmates guides many parents in their choice of school. We extend the literature on this issue by considering children making the transition from primary to secondary schooling at age-11 in England. We use year-to-year changes in school composition to identify the impact of schoolmates on pupil progress at age 14. Traditional 'linear-in-means' specifications lead us to conclude that prior achievements of a child's schoolmates are, on average, unrelated to his/her academic progress. However, this masks evidence that lower achieving pupils are disadvantaged by higher achieving schoolmates, whereas upper-middle ranking pupils benefit.

Suggested Citation

  • Steve Gibbons & Shqiponja Telhaj, 2008. "Peers and Achievement in England's Secondary Schools," SERC Discussion Papers 0001, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    • Handle: RePEc:cep:sercdp:0001
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Stephen Gibbons & Henry G. Overman, 2012. "Mostly Pointless Spatial Econometrics?," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(2), pages 172-191, May.
    2. Cheti Nicoletti & Birgitta Rabe, 2019. "Sibling spillover effects in school achievement," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 34(4), pages 482-501, June.
    3. Stephen Gibbons & Olmo Silva & Felix Weinhardt, 2013. "Everybody Needs Good Neighbours? Evidence from Students’ Outcomes in England," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 123, pages 831-874, September.
    4. Auestad, May Linn, 2018. "The effect of low-achieving peers," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 178-214.
    5. McVicar, Duncan & Moschion, Julie & Ryan, Chris, 2018. "Achievement effects from new peers: Who matters to whom?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 154-166.
    6. Gibbons, Stephen & Machin, Stephen & Silva, Olmo, 2013. "Valuing school quality using boundary discontinuity," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 45246, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    7. Wang, Haining & Cheng, Zhiming & Smyth, Russell, 2018. "Do migrant students affect local students’ academic achievements in urban China?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 64-77.
    8. Gibbons, Stephen & Silva, Olmo, 2011. "School quality, child wellbeing and parents' satisfaction," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 312-331, April.
    9. Gibbons, Stephen & Machin, Stephen & Silva, Olmo, 2013. "Valuing school quality using boundary discontinuities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 15-28.
    10. Ryan Yeung & Phuong Nguyen-Hoang, 2016. "Endogenous peer effects: Fact or fiction?," The Journal of Educational Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 109(1), pages 37-49, January.
    11. Charlotte Geay & Sandra McNally & Shqiponja Telhaj, 2013. "Non‐native Speakers of English in the Classroom: What Are the Effects on Pupil Performance?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0, pages 281-307, August.
    12. Machin, Stephen, 2011. "Houses and schools: Valuation of school quality through the housing market," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(6), pages 723-729.
    13. Roller, Marcus & Steinberg, Daniel, 2020. "The distributional effects of early school stratification - non-parametric evidence from Germany," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    14. Stephen Gibbons & Olmo Silva & Felix Weinhardt, 2010. "Do Neighbours Affect Teenage Outcomes? Evidence from Neighbourhood Changes in England," SERC Discussion Papers 0063, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.

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