Information, Accountability, and Family-School Engagement: Experimental Evidence from Colombia

Date: 

Tuesday, October 31, 2017, 12:00pm to 2:00pm

Location: 

CGIS South, S250, 1730 Cambridge Street

Speaker: Felipe Barrera-Osorio, Assistant Professor of Education and Economics, Harvard Graduate School of Education

Moderator: Steven Levitsky, Professor of Government, Harvard University

felipe_barrera_osorio

The intervention is in the city of Manizales, a mid-size Colombian city, with population close to half a million, and approximately 55,000 students in public basic education grades 1 to 11. Our intervention encompasses two experiments, one at the household level (information intervention) and one at the school level (family/school engagement intervention). The information intervention is designed to change the internal investment of the family as well as their relationship with the school. The family/school engagement intervention aims to increase engagement, trust, and communication between families and teachers/schools. The hypothesis is that parents from low-baseline performers have less information and may react more to treatment.