The long-run effects of reducing early school tracking

Abstract

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Vocational Education: An International Perspective

“…Pop-Eleches (2010, 2011) and Zilic (2018) study reforms in Romania and Croatia, respectively, which increased the length of time spent in general education prior to tracking. Canaan (2020) studies the long-term labor market effects of a French reform that extended general education by two years, from primary into middle grades, alongside curricular reforms and ability grouping.…”

“…7 The French reform, however, is associated with higher educational attainment and six percent higher wages by age 40-45. It is difficult to isolate the effect of later vocational tracking in France from the rest of a suite of reforms, but Canaan (2020) points to substitution of vocational diplomas for betterregarded technical degrees as one likely important mechanism.…”

Understanding the Response to High-Stakes Incentives in Primary Education

“…Hanushek and Wössmann, 2006;Ruhose and Schwerdt, 2016;Matthewes, 2020). 54 Second, much of the remaining evidence comes from studies looking at the long-run effects of postponing the age of tracking (Meghir and Palme, 2005;Aakvik et al, 2010;Pekkala Kerr et al, 2013;Borghans et al, 2020;Canaan, 2020). Students are still tracked at some point during secondary school in these contexts.…”

“…Hence, these students possibly only had limited ability to respond in earlier grades. Another related strand of the literature studies long-run effects (e.g., on educational attainment and wages in adulthood) of several de-tracking school reforms in Europe (see, e.g., Aakvik et al, 2010;Meghir and Palme, 2005;Pekkala Kerr et al, 2013;Canaan, 2020). Since these studies measure outcomes in adulthood and the de-tracking reforms did not abolish tracking but merely delayed it to higher grades in secondary school (and often coincided with other major changes to the school system), it is unclear how informative they are about the incentivizing effect of selective schools.…”

The Effects of Free Secondary School Track Choice: A Disaggregated Synthetic Control Approach

“…2 Recent contributions for the United States studying the effects of attending a magnet secondary school with a special curriculum and competitive admission process document basically no causal effects on student achievement (e.g., Abdulkadiroglu et al, 2014). Studies by Canaan (2020) for France and Meghir and Palme (2005) for Sweden evaluate reforms that involve multiple components in addition to postponing or abolishing tracking (i.e., increased compulsory schooling, changed curricula and teacher quality). They document beneficial effects on educational attainment and earnings especially for youths from disadvantaged backgrounds.…”