American Economic Journal:
Applied Economics
ISSN 1945-7782 (Print) | ISSN 1945-7790 (Online)
Academic Peer Effects with Different Group Assignment Policies: Residential Tracking versus Random Assignment
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
(pp. 345–69)
(Complimentary)
Abstract
I study the relative academic performance of students tracked or randomly assigned to South African university dormitories. Tracking reduces low-scoring students' GPAs and has little effect on high-scoring students, leading to lower and more dispersed GPAs. I also directly estimate peer effects using random variation in peer groups across dormitories. Living with higher-scoring peers raises students' GPAs, particularly for low-scoring students, and peer effects are stronger between socially proximate students. This shows that much of the treatment effect of tracking is attributable to peer effects. These results present a cautionary note about sorting students into academically homogeneous classrooms or neighborhoods.Citation
Garlick, Robert. 2018. "Academic Peer Effects with Different Group Assignment Policies: Residential Tracking versus Random Assignment." American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 10 (3): 345–69. DOI: 10.1257/app.20160626Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- I23 Higher Education; Research Institutions
- I24 Education and Inequality
- I28 Education: Government Policy
- O15 Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
- Z13 Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification