Report Cards: The Impact of Providing School and Child Test Scores on Educational Markets

Recent evidence on the impacts of information on service delivery has been mixed, with inform- ation even worsening,overall outcomes,if providers,start cream-skimming.,We examine,the impact of an experimental,intervention,that provides,school and,child-level report,cards on learning,in a sample of 112 villages in Pakistan, evenly divided into treatment and control villages. We tracked all 823 public and private primary schools, 12,000 grade III children, 5000 teachers and a sample of 1800 households,in these villages. The provision,of information,improved,overall learning,by 0.10 standard deviations and decreased private school fees by 18 percent. The largest gains, 0.34 standard deviations, were in private schools whose initial scores were below the median. Government schools saw a tenth of a standard,deviation,rise in learning. While private schools with above-median,initial scores showed no learning gains, they dropped fees by 22 percent. Improvements in learning appear to be driven,more,by increased,school,investments,likely due,to the report card enhancing,school competition, rather than through greater parental investments. The cost of providing information was,similar to the drop,in school fees and,the intervention,likely raised welfare by increasing child learning and,lowering,educational,costs. Pomona College, Development Research Group, World Bank, and Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.