Empirical studies on aspects of education inequality in Germany [Elektronische Ressource] / von Andrea Maria Mühlenweg

Andrea Maria Mühlenweg

Informations

• Publié par: gottfried_wilhelm_leibniz_universitat_hannover
• Publié le: 01 janvier 2007
• Nombre de lectures: 18
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

Empirical Studies on Aspects of Education Inequality in Germany





Von der Wirtschaftswissenschaftlichen Fakultät der
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Universität Hannover
zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades

Doktorin der Wirtschaftswissenschaften
- Doctor rerum politicarum -

genehmigte Dissertation

von Diplom-Volkswirtin, Master of Arts Andrea Maria Mühlenweg

geboren am 27.03.1977 in Karlsruhe

2007














































Erstgutacher: Prof. Dr. Patrick Puhani

Zweitgutachter: Prof. Dr. Horst Entorf

Tag der Disputation: 08.11.2007
2









Diese Arbeit widme ich Hans-Jörg,
meinen Eltern und der ganzen Familie























3 Acknowledgment

First and foremost, I would like to thank my supervisor Patrick Puhani for his continuous
guidance, encouragement and support during the development of this thesis. His expertise,
insights and suggestions shaped my research skills and prepared me for future challenges.
Throughout my doctoral work he encouraged me to develop independent project ideas. I am
grateful to him and to my co-advisor Horst Entorf for helpful advices and inspiring discus-
sions during these last three years.

I am indebted to colleagues at Darmstadt University of Technology and the Leibniz Univer-
sity of Hannover for valuable discussions. The different chapters of this thesis benefited from
valuable comments and support of various persons and institutions who and which are men-
tioned and thanked at the beginning of the respective studies. Especially Christian Dustmann,
Bernd Fitzenberger, Gianno De Fraja, Peter Fredriksson, Knut Gerlach, Szilvia Hamori, Olaf
Hübler, Michael Lechner, Edwin Leuwen, Stephen Machin, Sandra McNally, Uwe Jirjahn,
Christian Pfeifer, Sergiy Radyakin, Regina Riphahn, Kjell Salvanes, Claus Schnabel, Rein-
hold Schnabel, Kerstin Schneider, Uta Schönberg and participants in the Ph.D. seminars in
Applied Labour Economics at the University of Hannover, Darmstadt University of Technol-
ogy and the ZEW-Rhein-Main-Neckar-Seminar provided valuable comments to me or the co-
author of the two included joint papers at conference or workshop presentations. Thanks to
Philip Savage and Björn Schumacher for excellent research assistance.

Financial support from the Anglo-German Foundation within the project ‘The Economics and
Politics of Employment, Migration and Social Justice’ of the initiative ‘Creating Sustainable
Growth in Europe’ is gratefully acknowledged for parts of the projects. Thanks to Hans-Peter
Hafner of the Research Data Center (Forschungsdatenzentrum) of the Statistical Office of the
state of Hessen for his cooperation and help with the administrative data. I am obliged to the
school principal, teachers, pupils and parents as well as persons at the local school authority
for their support of the school intervention study.

I am especially grateful to my colleagues and friends Anabell and Oliver for sharing a lot of
cups of coffees and cookies and thus increasing my labour productivity. Similarly, I extend
many thanks to my sister Christiane and her husband Ulli as well as to my friends Ute, Berna-
dette, Claudia, Mareike and Lana. I am grateful to Jochen, who, about four years ago, pointed
4 out to me that people at Darmstadt University of Technology might be interested in empirical
education research and thus made me being interested in this place.

Finally, but most importantly, I would like to thank my husband Hans-Jörg for being so un-
derstanding and patient during these years and especially the last three weeks. To him and my
parents I owe a debt of gratitude for their support and motivation and for being a wonderful
family.
5 Abstract

This dissertation considers aspects of education inequality in Germany. The German educa-
tion system is known to produce relatively high education inequality, particularly as a result
of selecting pupils into secondary school tracks when they are about ten years old. The studies
presented discuss different sources with the potential to increase flexibility and to decrease
inequality in education. Firstly, the establishment of so-called ‘support stages’, which delay
the timing of tracking for two years (to seventh grade), is examined. Furthermore, German
school entry-age regulations are considered, where flexibilities related to the track choice may
again reduce initial disadvantages of early school entrants. Finally, a school intervention pro-
ject examines the benefits of single-gender education. This project aims to investigate whether
gender specific preferences related to technical subjects may be changed through such an in-
tervention.

Keywords: education, inequality, identification










Kurzzusammenfassung

Die vorliegende Dissertation untersucht verschiedene Aspekte der Bildungsungleichheit in
Deutschland. Das deutsche Bildungswesen mit dem selektiven, dreigliedrigen Sekundarschul-
system hat den Ruf, eine hohe Bildungsungleichheit zu produzieren. Diese Arbeit weist ver-
schiedene Flexibilitätspotentiale auf, die abschwächend auf die starke Selektivität des Sys-
tems und die beobachtete Bildungsungleichheit wirken könnten. So wird zunächst die Wir-
kung der Förderstufen untersucht, welche die Zuweisung auf die unterschiedlichen Sekundar-
schulformen um zwei Jahre (auf die siebte Klasse) verschieben. Außerdem wird die Auswir-
kung gegenwärtiger Einschulungsregelungen beleuchtet, wobei wiederum Flexibilitäten im
Schulsystem frühe Nachteile, die jung eingeschulten Kindern entstehen, ausgleichen können.
Ferner wird die Möglichkeit des zeitweise getrennt geschlechtlichen Unterrichts diskutiert;
dabei wird im Rahmen eines Schulprojektes der Frage nachgegangen, ob fächerspezifische
Unterschiede von Jungen und Mädchen durch eine solche Unterrichtsorganisation beeinflusst
werden können.

Schlagworte: Bildung, Ungleichheit, Identifikation

6 Contents

List of Tables 9
List of Figures 12
List of Abbreviations 13

Introduction 15


Chapter 1:
Educational Effects of Alternative Secondary School Tracking Regimes in Germany 17

1.1 Introduction to Chapter 1 20
1.2 Stylized Facts 22
1.2.1 Institutional Background 22
1.2.2 Principles of Tracking in Hessen 24
1.2.3 Data Sets and Descriptive Analysis 25
1.3 Econometric Strategies and Regression Results 29
1.3.1 Identification Strategy and Specifications for the Econometric Analysis 29
1.3.2 Regression Results 321.4 Conclusions of Chapter 1 35

References for Chapter 1 37
Tables and Figures for Chapter 1 39
Appendix to Chapter 1 54


Chapter 2:
Instrumental Variable Estimates of Educational Effects of Age at School Entry in Germany 55

2.1 Introduction to Chapter 2 58
2.2 Age at School Entry and the German Education System 61
2.3 Data 64
2.3.1 The Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 64
2.3.2 Administrative Data on All Pupils in the State of Hessen 65
2.3.3 The Youth and Young Adult Longitudinal Survey 66
2.4 The Exogeneity of Month of Birth and First-Stage Regressions 68
2.4.1 The Endogeneity of Age at School Entry 68
2.4.2 The Exogeneity of the Instruments 69
2.4.3 First-Stage Regressions 72
2.5 The Effect of Age at School Entry on Educational Outcomes 75
2.5.1 Ordinary Least Squares Results 75
2.5.2 Two-Stage Least Squares Results 75
2.5.3 Results for Subgroups 79
2.6 Conclusions of Chapter 2 81

References for Chapter 2 85
Tables and Figures for Chapter 2 88
Appendix to Chapter 2 100
7


Chapter 3:
How Persistent Is the Age At School Entry Effect in a System of Flexible Tracking? 101

3.1 Introduction to Chapter 3 104
3.2 Institutional Facts and Administrative Data Source 108
3.2.1 School Tracking 108
3.2.2 Administrative Student-Level Data for the State of Hessen 110
3.3 Identification of Age at School Entry Effects on Track Attendance 113
3.3.1 Implications of the Hamburg Accord and Discretion in Track Choice 113
3.3.2 Exploiting the Exogenous Variation in the Assigned Age at School Entry 116
3.3.3 First-Stage Regressions 119
3.4 School Entry Age Effects on Track Attendance in Secondary School 120
3.4.1 Ordinary Least Squares Regression 120
3.4.2 Causal Effects: Regression Discontinuity Estimates 122
3.4.3 Is the Age at School Entry Effect Eliminated by Institutions or Time Itself? 125
3.4.4 Do We Exp