 Raising College Access and Completion: How Much Can Free College Help ?Maria Marta Ferreyra, Carlos Garriga (), Juan David Martin and Angelica Maria Sanchez Diaz No 9428, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank Abstract: Free college proposals have become increasingly popular in many countries, yet cross-countryevidence indicates that higher college subsidies raise enrollment but not graduation rates. To capture the evidenceand evaluate proposals, this paper develops and estimates a dynamic model of college enrollment, performance, andgraduation. A central piece of the model, student effort, has a direct effect on class completion and an indirecteffect mitigating the risk of performing poorly or dropping out. The model is estimated using rich student-level datafrom Colombia, and multiple free college programs are simulated. Among them, universal free college expandsenrollment the most but does not affect graduation rates, thereby helping explain the evidence. Performance-based freecollege, in contrast, raises graduation rates yet has a smaller enrollment impact. Keywords: Educational Sciences; Tertiary Education; Public Sector Economics; Public Financial Management; Public Finance Decentralization and Poverty Reduction; Labor & Employment Law; Rural Labor Markets; Labor Markets (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:9428 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank 1818 H Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20433. Contact information at EDIRC. |
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