Teachers, Family and Friends : Essays in Economics of Education

Abstract: Family background and school performance during a turbulent era of school reformsIn the 1990s, Swedish education policy took several steps towards more decentralization and more room for parental school choice. We study the relationship between school performance and family background during this period of time. We use two measures of family background; sibling correlations in grade point average (GPA) and correlations between the child’s GPA and parental income. We find that both relationships were remarkably stable over this turbulent period of time.Is the Gender Gap in School Performance Affected by the Sex of the Teacher?We investigate whether the gender performance gap can be attributed to the fact that the teacher profession is female dominated, that is, is there a causal effect on student outcome from having a same-sex teacher? We find no strong support for our initial hypothesis that a same-sex teacher improves student outcome.Detracking Swedish compulsory schools – any losers, any winners?In this paper I exploit the fact that different tracking policies were practiced simultaneously in Swedish compulsory schools, but also that tracking policies changed over time within schools. The results show that there are no average effects of tracking but differential effects. Students with a low-educated family background are more likely to fail math at high school if they have attended a school that practiced tracking than their non-tracked peers.Estimating Peer Effects in Swedish High School using School, Teacher, and Student Fixed Effects.In this paper I use a rich dataset in order to observe each student over time in different subjects and courses. I find positive peer effects for the average student, but also non-linear effects. Lower achievers benefit more from an increase in both mean and the spread in peer achievement within the classroom than their higher-achieving peers.