Africa’s Skill Tragedy: Does Teachers’ Lack of Knowledge Lead to Low Student Performance?

Jan Bietenbeck, Marc Piopiunik and Simon Wiederhold ()

Journal of Human Resources, 2018, vol. 53, issue 3, 553-578

Abstract: We study the importance of teacher subject knowledge for student performance in Sub-Saharan Africa using unique international assessment data for sixth-grade students and their teachers. To circumvent bias due to unobserved student heterogeneity, we exploit variation within students across math and reading. Teacher subject knowledge has a modest impact on student performance. Exploiting vast cross-country differences in economic development, we find that teacher knowledge is effective only in more developed African countries. Results are robust to adding teacher fixed effects and accounting for potential sorting based on subject-specific factors.

JEL-codes: I20 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
Note: DOI: 10.3368/jhr.53.3.0616-8002R1
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (30)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Africa's Skill Tragedy: Does Teachers' Lack of Knowledge Lead to Low Student Performance? (2016)
Working Paper: Africa's Skill Tragedy: Does Teachers' Lack of Knowledge Lead to Low Student Performance? (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:uwp:jhriss:v:53:y:2018:i:3:p:553-578

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