Does Money Matter for Student Performance? Evidence from a Grant Program in Uganda

Type Working Paper - Institute for International Economic Studies (IIES)
Title Does Money Matter for Student Performance? Evidence from a Grant Program in Uganda
Author(s)
Issue 326
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2006
URL https://ideas.repec.org/p/igi/igierp/326.html
Abstract
In response to extensive corruption in the education sector, the Government of Uganda began to publish newspaper ads on the timing and amount of funds disbursed to the districts. The intent of the campaign was to boost schoolsíand parentsíability to monitor the local o¢ cials in charge of disbursing funds to the schools. The mass information campaign was successful. But since newspaper penetration varies greatly across districts, the exposure to information about the program, and thus funding, di§er across districts. I use this variation in program exposure between districts to evaluate whether public funds have an e§ect on student performance. The results show that money matters: On average, students in districts highly exposed to the information campaign, and hence to the grant program, scored 0.40 standard deviations better in the Primary Leaving Exam (PLE) than students in districts less exposed to information. The results are robust to controlling for a broad range of confounding factors.

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