Causal evidence on the effectiveness of management in education is limited and ambiguous. In this study, we investigate how cost-effective management practices boost student learning through a randomised field experiment conducted with 31,760 students from 80 grade 1-9 public schools in the municipality of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The experimental intervention, delivered exclusively by municipal servants to school managers, involved one-to-one coaching and on-the-job training focused on implementing the World Management Survey (WMS)'s ``23 best management practices'' for the education sector. We also conducted two double-blind, in-depth management surveys, one prior to and one following the programme implementation, to evaluate precisely the quality of management in schools. The surveys were based on the WMS methodology. After two years, the estimated average treatment effects were 0.928 (0.260) SD for school management, 0.226 (0.059) SD for reading, and 0.237 (0.059) SD for mathematics. Instrumental variable estimates indicate that a one-point improvement in school management (on a 1–-5 scale) led to gains of 0.680 (0.245) SD in reading and 0.714 (0.265) SD in mathematics. Students in schools that achieved a one-point management improvement were more than two academic years ahead of peers in untreated schools. We present causal estimates amongst the largest in the education intervention literature based on a programme that costs only $15.22 (PPP-adjusted) per student per year. The programme can be applied to any school and has expanded in Brazil.

Authors:
Felipe Puccioni, Court of Accounts of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

About the Presenter(s)
Felipe Galvão Puccioni is a judge at the Rio de Janeiro Court of Accounts. Interested in public administration, causal inference, and education policy. Currently studying how randomised school-management experiments in Brazil affect learning.

Connect on Linkedin
https://www.linkedin.com/in/felipe-galv%C3%A3o-puccioni-phd-102088358/

See this presentation on the full schedule – Saturday Schedule

Bookmark