Are Public Libraries Improving Quality of Education? : When the Provision of Public Goods is Not Enough
This paper analyzes the relation between public, education-related infrastructure and the quality of education in schools. The analysis uses a case study of the establishment of two large, high-quality public libraries in low-income areas in Bogotá...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
Washington, DC
2015
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2015/09/25103257/public-libraries-improving-quality-education-provision-public-goods-not-enough http://hdl.handle.net/10986/22852 |
| Summary: | This paper analyzes the relation between
public, education-related infrastructure and the quality of
education in schools. The analysis uses a case study of the
establishment of two large, high-quality public libraries in
low-income areas in Bogotá, Colombia. It assesses the impact
of these libraries on the quality of education by comparing
national test scores (SABER 11) for schools close to and far
from the libraries before (2000–02) and after (2003–08) the
libraries were opened. The paper introduces a Blinder-Oaxaca
decomposition on difference-in-differences estimates to assess
whether variation of traditional determinants of
mathematics, verbal, and science test scores explains the
estimates. The analysis finds differences that are not
statistically different from zero that could be attributed to
the establishment of the libraries. These results are robust
to alternative specifications, a synthetic control approach,
and an alternative measure of distance. |
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