An essay in the microeconometrics of education.

Summary Using recent developments in microeconometrics, this thesis studies two key issues in education economics: grade repetition and class size. After a first chapter that discusses the econometric problems related to the specification and estimation of the education production function, chapter 2 estimates the effect of class size on the probability of moving from one year to the next in college. It models student pathways as a succession of transitions in which each student may pass, repeat or be referred. The identification strategy is based on the discontinuity rule of theoretical class size versus total grade size. The results show that class size has a negative effect on the probability of passage for the first two years of college. Chapter 3 estimates the treatment effect of repetition, using value-added score as the outcome and birth quarter as the instrument. We find that repetition is an effective measure that allows a student to catch up. Chapter 4 studies both questions from Chapters 2 and 3 simultaneously. It models learning as a process of human capital accumulation through the different stages of schooling. Unobserved heterogeneity is taken into account through a factor model allowing to construct the distribution of factual counterfactuals and therefore to estimate the marginal treatment effect of repetition and to simulate various public policy effects. This model is richer than those of the two previous chapters and confirms their results.