Does a “bad apple” spoil the bunch? The impact of low-achieving students on non-cognitive outcomes

This paper investigates whether the presence of low-achieving classmates affects the noncognitive outcomes of regular students in junior high school. Exploiting random assignments of teachers and students to classes, we show that having classmates who had ever repeated a grade in primary school improves students' mental health and social skills, and the positive peer effects are concentrated among students with a longer duration of peer exposure and students from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Mechanism analysis reveals that the improved teacher–student and student–student interactions contribute to the enhancement of noncognitive outcomes.     

Classroom peer effects and academic achievement: Evidence from a Chinese middle school

This paper estimates peer effects on student achievement using a panel data set from a middle school in China. Unique features of the organization of Chinese middle schools (Grades 7 to 9) and panel data allow us to overcome difficulties that have hindered the separation of peer effects from omitted individual factors due to self-selection and from common teacher effects and to identify peer effects at the classroom level. We estimate peer effects for Math, English, and Chinese test scores separately. In a linear-in-means model controlling for both individual and teacher-by-test fixed effects, peers are found to have a positive and significant effect on math test scores, a positive but insignificant effect on Chinese test scores, but no effect on English test scores. Importantly, in Math and Chinese students at the middle of the ability distribution tend to benefit from better peers, whereas students at the ends of the ability distribution do not, suggesting that policy makers who want to exploit positive peer effects face difficult tradeoffs in classroom and school assignment.     

Do selective high schools improve student achievement? Effects of exam schools in China

We use regression discontinuity design to examine the effect of a system of public exam high schools, which admit students solely by pre-existing achievement, on student college entrance exam scores in Beijing, China. More selective exam schools may have higher peer quality and sometimes are equipped with more experienced teachers and better facilities. We find, however, that elite exam high schools, which are the most selective, have no effects on student test scores. We find that on average the system of exam schools improves student performance on the exam, which indicates that students benefit from attending more selective non-elite schools. The results on qualifying for college admission are consistent with our findings about test scores. Differences among schools in peer achievement, student/teacher ratio and the percentage of certificated and experienced teachers partially explain our findings; self-choices of track and exam participation do not explain test scores or college admission.     

Elite schools,magnet classes,and academic performances: Regression-discontinuity evidence from China

Employing a unique data from a county in rural China, we use the regression-discontinuity design to study the causal effects of elite school and magnet class enrollment. Our data contains two admissive processes, allowing us to separately examine elite school and magnet class effects on two groups of students with different abilities. Results show that enrollment in elite schools has small and insignificant effect on borderline student scores in the college entrance examination, whereas studying at a magnet class can significantly boast borderline student CEE score by 0.435 standard deviations. We provide suggestive evidence that teacher effect is roughly 40% of the magnitude of the peer effects associated with the score gain in magnet classes. We also find magnet class experience can improve the probability of entering high-quality academic universities. By comparing the effects of two cutoffs with different student abilities, our findings support the claim that the effect of elite school/magnet class enrollment depends on student abilities.     

Does Teacher Subject Knowledge Contribute to Student Academic Performance in Developing and Least Developed Countries?

Little is known about the causal impact of teacher knowledge on student performance. In this research paper we intend to approach the potential causal effect (i.e. going beyond correlation) of sixth grade teachers’ knowledge on their students’ academic achievement for three Sub-Saharan African countries. To achieve this, we have used the heterogeneity of teachers’ subject knowledge and students’ correspondent academic achievement within-student between-subjects using student fixed effects. Concretely, our work is based on previous research by Bietenbeck, Piopiunik and Wiederhold. Compared to them, we do not use countries that lack representative information after keeping only those students taught by the same teacher for the subjects under analysis. This enables us to obtain more reliable results on this issue. Our results indicate that teacher subject knowledge in reading and mathematics does not have a significant influence on student academic achievement in these subjects for the countries under scrutiny. Many robustness checks have corroborated this conclusion, which contrasts with the positive effect found by Bietenbeck, Piopiunik and Wiederhold.     

Classmates and friends matter! Peer effects on cognitive ability formation

In this paper, we investigate the impact of peer effects on cognitive ability formation at two different levels – class peers and close friends simultaneously. We use random class assignments in the China Education Panel Survey (CEPS) to deal with ability sorting and self-selection into classroom when estimating class peer effects. To identify close friend peer effects, we include initial human capital to control for time-invariant unobservables, as stable friendship implies that unobserved preference based on which students make friends is likely to stay unchanged, especially within the one-year frame of the data. We find significant positive peer effects on students' cognitive ability formation at both levels. Peer effects are heterogeneous across student ability. Peer effects work through two channels – peer conformity and peer complementarity. We find both channels generate positive peer effects and jointly determine the size of overall estimated peer effects.     

Compensating for academic loss: Online learning and student performance during the COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to widespread school shutdowns, with many continuing distance education via online-learning platforms. We here estimate the causal effects of online education on student exam performance using administrative data from Chinese Middle Schools. Taking a difference-in-differences approach, we find that receiving online education during the COVID-19 lockdown improved student academic results by 0.22 of a standard deviation, relative to pupils without learning support from their school. Not all online education was equal: students who were given recorded online lessons from external higher-quality teachers had higher exam scores than those whose lessons were recorded by teachers from their own school. The educational benefits of distance learning were the same for rural and urban students, but the exam performance of students who used a computer for online education was better than those who used a smartphone. Last, while everyone except the very-best students performed better with online learning, it was low achievers who benefited from teacher quality.     

The Effect of Peer and Professor Gender on College Student Performance

The effects of peer and professor gender on student performance have been examined separately but not in conjunction. We augment previous research by including peer and professor gender, as well as their interaction, in estimations of student performance. After controlling for both student and faculty fixed effects we find that female students typically perform better than males, but this performance gap varies depending on the gender of the professor and of the classroom. Overall the effect of professor gender on student performance is small at best if classrooms are predominantly female and much larger if classrooms are predominantly male.     

Education Vouchers,the Peer Group Problem,and the Question of Dropouts

This paper extends the analysis of Epple and Romano (1998a, b), who argue that vouchers encourage private schools to “skim the cream off” public schools. Because the education received by students depends on the quality of their classmates, this loss reduces the quality of education received by those remaining in the public system—the peer group effect. In our model, vouchers allow low-income students to escape the frustration of having to conform to the uniformity of the public school system. Ultimately, the size of the dropout effect relative to the peer group effect is an empirical question. Nevertheless, to the extent that voucher use reduces the student dropout rate, the peer group externality becomes insufficient in itself to prevent reconsideration of a voucher system on equity as well as efficiency grounds.     

Peer effects among graduate students: Evidence from China

This paper examines peer effects among graduate students in a Chinese university. We implement a quasi-experiment empirical strategy and find that a student's master GPA is positively associated with his roommates' college GPA. Our results exclude the possibilities that the peer effects are driven by the spillover of peer intelligence or effort level but support the academic skill mechanism.     

反思教学法的运用——以《毛泽东思想和中国特色社会主义理论体系概论》课为例

反思教学法在高校《毛泽东思想和中国特色社会主义理论体系概论》课中的应用是提高教学质量的有效途径之一。反思教学法能激发教师从课程理念、专业知识、实践效果以及学生的反馈等多角度地对本课程教学进行理性反思和实践探索,不断提升教师自身的教学水平,从而提高课堂的控制力,达到预期的教学目标。     

The impact of teacher credentials on student achievement in China

Teacher quality is an important factor in improving student achievement. As such, policymakers have constructed a number of different credentials to identify high quality teachers. Unfortunately, few of the credentials used in developing countries have been validated (in terms of whether teachers holding such credentials actually improve student achievement). In this study, we employ a student-fixed effects model to estimate the impact of teacher credentials on student achievement in the context of the biggest education system in the world: China. We find that having a teacher with the highest rank (a credential based on annual assessments by local administrators) has positive impacts on student achievement relative to having a teacher who has not achieved the highest rank. We further find that teacher rank has heterogeneous impacts, benefiting economically poor students more than non-poor students. However, whether a teacher attends college or holds teaching awards does not appear to provide additional information on teacher quality (in terms of improving student achievement).     

Teachers’ unions and industrial action in South African primary schools: Exploring their impacts on learning

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates a disruption hypothesis that student learning is lost as a direct consequence of teacher strike action in South Africa. At face value estimates from a within-student across-subject analysis suggest that teacher strike participation negatively affects learning for students in the poorest three quarters of schools. Strike action also limits access to nutrition as school closures prevent student participation in daily school feeding programmes. However, despite controlling for student and school level factors that may drive teacher selection into strike participation, unobserved teacher characteristics continue to bias estimates. Assuming that selection on observable characteristics can tell us something about selection on unobservable characteristics, there is an implied negative selection of teachers into strike participation.     

Role of Information on Consumers’ Willingness‐to‐pay for Genetically‐modified Rice with Health Benefits: An Application to China

Despite their potential health benefits, the controversial nature surrounding the use of GM technology in biofortified crops remains a subject of discussion. This paper investigates the role of information on willingness‐to‐pay for folate‐biofortified rice in a Chinese folate‐deficient region. We conducted second price auctions with 252 women of childbearing age, split up into two target groups based on street (n = 132, non‐student sample) or school auctions (n = 120, student sample). Notwithstanding a general positive effect of folate‐related information (i.e. content, benefits and regional situation), evidence reveals that the non‐student sample is less concerned about GM technology. The results also provide insight into serial position effects in conflicting GM information. Whereas participants in the non‐student sample are more prone to a primacy bias when receiving both positive and negative information, an alarmist reaction is observed in the student sample. This study highlights the need for segmented, targeted communication strategies on biofortification.     

Computer technology in education: Evidence from a pooled study of computer assisted learning programs among rural students in China

There is a great degree of heterogeneity among the studies that investigate whether computer technologies improve education and how students benefit from them – if at all. The overall goal of this study is to assess the effectiveness of computing technologies to raise educational performance and non-cognitive outcomes and identify what program components are most effective in doing so. To achieve this aim we pool the data sets of five separate studies about computer technology programs that include observations of 16,856 students from 171 primary schools across three provinces in China. We find that overall computing technologies have positive and significant impacts on student academic achievement in both math and in Chinese. The programs are found to be more effective if they are implemented out-of-school, avoiding what appear to be substitution effects when programs are run during school. The programs also have heterogeneous effects by gender. Specifically, boys gain more than girls in Chinese. We did not find heterogeneous effects by student initial achievement levels. We also found that the programs that help students learn math—but not Chinese—have positive impacts on student self-efficacy.     

浅谈“待进生”在体育教学中的转化

体育＂待进生＂成因各有不同,他们在学生群体中的外在表现是麻木、冷漠、叛逆和不服从权威,与团体格格不入并对其他团体有极负面的影响。遵循教育规律,转变待进学生,已成为当前课改的＂热点＂。如何帮助体育＂待进生＂改变学习困境,让他们对体育学习感兴趣、有信心,是体育教师面临的极大挑战和义不容辞的责任。在新课程理念下,从优化体育课堂氛围,优化体育课堂师生关系,优化学生的课堂心境,建立多元评价激励机制等方面探讨如何转化体育＂待进生＂。     

A Primer for New Teachers of Economics

In many economics programs, both graduate students and new assistant professors are thrown into the classroom without guidance, with the potential for negative ramifications that can last throughout their careers as teachers. This article is a primer in which we offer unique insights into useful methods and practices for new teachers in the economics profession. We discuss organizational and logistical issues that new teachers must consider and then offer our advice on specific pedagogical tools and techniques. Following the growing literature on the benefits of student‐centered and interactive instruction, we focus on ways instructors can move away from the traditional “chalk and talk” approach. We organize and present these alternative pedagogies in terms of their level of complexity and time required. We conclude with suggestions and resources for the continued growth and development of new teachers in economics.     

Are female teachers more likely to practice grade inflation? Evidence from China

Grade inflation has become a global phenomenon that raises concerns in the academia and the public. This study examines whether high grades accompanying with the growth of female teachers arise from student improvement or grade inflation. We use randomly assigned samples from the China Education Panel Survey and obtain the following results. (1) Students taught by female teachers obtain 1.57 grades point higher compared with those taught by male teachers. High grades do not result from student progress but from grade inflation. (2) Female teachers practice grade inflation for different students, and the effect is more pronounced among female students, low-ability students, and students in senior grades. (3) Female teachers may adopt a high-grades practice due to potential pressures under discrimination and uncertainty rather than for the sake of course or students. (4) Last, high grades brought by female teachers lead to less effort for students in the second year. This paper not only provides data support for understanding the increasing grade inflation, but also offers clear implications for the improvement of evaluation systems.     

Teacher Pay and Educational Outcomes: Evidence from the Rural Hardship Allowance in Zambia

This paper studies the effect of unconditional teacher salary increases on teacher and student outcomes. To study the issue, we evaluate the rural hardship allowance in Zambia, which corresponds to a salary increase of 20%. This allowance is allocated to schools on the basis of a distance criterion allowing us to use a regression discontinuity design. We use administrative data from 2004 to 2015 on school, teacher characteristics and test scores. The administrative data are complemented with a telephone survey of schools close to the eligibility threshold. We find that crossing the threshold increases the share of teachers obtaining the allowance by 40%. Because of some non‐compliance with the allocation rule, our estimates are fairly imprecise. Focusing on provinces with better compliance we find some, albeit weak, evidence that the allowance increases the stock of teachers. We, however, find no effects on teacher characteristics or on student test scores.     

教师如何形成正确的学生观

树立正确的学习观意义重大,可以优化教学过程和提升教学效果。形成正确的学生观,其主要途径在于学会因材施教,承认学生差异,量体裁衣;尊重学生,发挥他们的主观能动性;相信学生是可以转变的,充分挖掘他们的学习潜力;形成融洽的师生关系,用教师情感去点燃学生对知识的渴求之火。