Does the Choice of University Matter? A Study of the Differences across UK Universites in Life Sciences Students' Degree Performance

Massimiliano Bratti ()

HEW from EconWPA

Abstract: This paper investigates differences across UK universities in 1993 life sciences students' degree performance using individual-level data from the Universities' Statistical Record (USR). Differences across universities are analysed by specifying and estimating a subject- specific educational production function. Even after including a wide range of controls for the quality of students, significant differences emerge across universities in students' degree performance. We apply a two-stage estimation procedure and find evidence that a large part of 'university effects' cannot be explained by the kind of institutional inputs commonly used in the literature on school quality. Finally, we compare the unadjusted ranking of universities based on the proportion of 'good' (first and upper second class honours) degrees awarded with that based on the estimated probability of a 'good' degree obtained from the microeconometric model and find significant differences between the two indicators of universities' performance.

Keywords: educational economics; input-output analysis; ordered probit; performance indicators; value-added (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2001-02-26
Note: Type of Document - Acrobat PDF; prepared on Toshiba PC ;
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http://129.3.20.41/eps/hew/papers/0012/0012003.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Does the choice of university matter? A study of the differences across uk universities in life sciences students' degree performance (2001)
Journal Article: Does the choice of university matter?: a study of the differences across UK universities in life sciences students' degree performance (2002)
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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wpa:wuwphe:0012003

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