Incentives are widely used to increase people's effort and thus performance. Whileacademic achievement depends heavily on effort, there is little empirical evidence onhow students respond to incentives other than grades and monetary rewards. We drawon two natural experiments that occurred at a...

Over the last decade, many countries have experienced dramatic increases in university enrolment, which, when not matched by compensating increases in other inputs, have resulted in larger class sizes. Using administrative records from a leading UK university, we present evidence on the effects...

We study how class size and composition affect the academic and labor market performances of college students, two crucial policy questions given the secular increase in college enrollment. We rely on the random assignment of students to teaching classes. Our results suggest that a one standard...

This volume was prepared by Susanne Link during her stay at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich and the Department of Human Capital and Innovation of the Ifo Institute of Economic Research. It was accepted as a doctoral thesis by the Economics Departure of the University of Munich in...

Over the last decade and a half, the Australian Universities have been subjected to a series of reforms introduced by the Australian Commonwealth Government. This paper discusses these reforms, subsequent policy changes, and their impact on the Australian university system. I will argue that the...

Gender disparities in education raise many questions for governments and civil societies. There are many factors that contribute to the gender gap in education. In Eritrea, gender disparities persist in the enrolment rates between boys and girls at all levels. Gender inequality has become a...

Doctorates have long attracted attention of those aspiring to scholarship and research, but also those seeking verbal distinctions and a documented knowledge. Doctoral degrees are considered as signs of a high level expertise and authority in a given filed. The growing number of dissertation...

In this paper we estimate the marriage market returns to being admitted to a higher ranked (i.e. more 'elite') university by exploiting unique features of the Chilean university admission system. This system centrally allocates applicants based on their university entrance test score, which...