The impact of vouchers on preschool attendance and elementary school readiness: A randomized controlled trial in rural China |
| |
| Institution: | 1. Department of Biostatistics, University at Albany, the State University of New York, 1 Univeristy Place, New York, Rensselaer 12144, United States;2. Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, College of Public Health, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States;3. Department of Environment Health Sciences, University at Albany, the State University of New York, New York, Rensselaer, United States;4. Guangdong Provincial People''s Hospital, Guangdong Academy of Medical Sciences, Guangdong Cardiovascular Institute, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China;5. Department of Environmental Medicine, New York University, New York, United States;6. Department of Population Health, New York University, New York, United States;1. Department of Education and the Brain & Motivation Research Institute (bMRI), Korea University, Seoul, South Korea;2. Department of Education, Daegu National University of Education, Daegu, South Korea;1. Faculty of Education, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong;2. Department of Educational Studies, Faculty of Human Sciences, Macquarie University, Australia |
| |
| Abstract: | Although preschool has been shown to improve children's school readiness in many developing countries, preschool attendance in poor rural areas of China is still low. The high cost of preschool is often regarded as a major barrier to attendance. In this paper, we evaluate the impact of a one-year voucher/CCT intervention on preschool attendance and school readiness. To do so, we conducted a randomized controlled trial among 150 young children in a poor, rural county in China. Our analysis shows that the intervention, consisting of a tuition waiver and a cash transfer conditional on attendance, raised attendance by 20 percentage points (or by 35%). However, the intervention did not have measurable impact on children's school readiness. We believe that poor quality of preschool education in rural China (in terms of both teaching and facilities) contributes to our findings. |
| |
| Keywords: | Preschool attendance School readiness Voucher and conditional cash transfer Randomized controlled trials Educational performance Rural China |
| 本文献已被 ScienceDirect 等数据库收录！ |
|
