Assessing the Impacts of Mais Educacao on Educational Outcomes : Evidence between 2007 and 2011
To address the educational gap, many Latin American countries are focusing on extension of the school day and enrichment of the curriculum. In Brazil, a nationwide policy -- Mais Educação -- was implemented in 2008 with this objective. This paper e...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2016
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2016/04/26240810/assessing-impacts-mais-educação-educational-outcomes-evidence-between-2007-2011 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/24218 |
| Summary: | To address the educational gap, many
Latin American countries are focusing on extension of the
school day and enrichment of the curriculum. In Brazil, a
nationwide policy -- Mais Educação -- was implemented in
2008 with this objective. This paper explores the nationwide
rollout of the program across the country and compares the
performance of schools before and after implementation of
the program. The paper quantifies the impacts of the program
on student learning and dropout rates in urban areas, and
investigates the heterogeneity of impacts by several
characteristics of the program's implementation.
Participating schools are compared with nonparticipating
schools after controlling for school selection into the
program based on observable characteristics using propensity
score matching. The analysis finds that participation in
Mais Educação has on average no impacts on school dropout
rates and average negative impacts on mathematics test
scores. The negative impacts on student achievement are
stronger in the short term, which suggests that the negative
effects may be reduced as the program improves its
implementation. In addition, especially for fifth-grade
schools, the level of student spending is associated with
reduced dropout rates. Interestingly, in schools choosing
the fields of Portuguese and/or sports in the added hours,
the program is associated with lower test scores in
Portuguese and mathematics. Finally, for the sample of
fifth-grade schools, heterogeneous impacts are seen in the
program according to the GDP per capita of the city where
the school is located. The higher the GDP per capita, the
greater the positive impact of the program on mathematics
test scores and on dropout rates. |
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