IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/labeco/v15y2008i1p37-53.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Is the gender gap in school performance affected by the sex of the teacher

Author

Listed:
  • Holmlund, Helena
  • Sund, Krister

Abstract

Girls outperform boys in school. We investigate whether the gender performance gap can be attributed to the fact that the teacher profession is female dominated, that is, is there a causal effect on student outcomes from having a same-sex teacher? Using data on uppersecondary school students and their teachers from the municipality of Stockholm, Sweden, we find that the gender performance differential is larger in subjects where the share of female teachers is higher. We argue, however, that this effect can not be interpreted as causal, mainly due to teacher selection into different subjects and nonrandom student-teacher matching. Exploring the fact that teacher turnover and student mobility give rise to variation in teacher’s gender within student and subject, we estimate the effect on student outcomes of changing to a teacher of the same sex. We find no strong support for our initial hypothesis that a same-sex teacher improves student outcomes.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Holmlund, Helena & Sund, Krister, 2008. "Is the gender gap in school performance affected by the sex of the teacher," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(1), pages 37-53, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:labeco:v:15:y:2008:i:1:p:37-53
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0927-5371(06)00094-7
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Steven G. Rivkin & Eric A. Hanushek & John F. Kain, 2005. "Teachers, Schools, and Academic Achievement," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 73(2), pages 417-458, March.
    2. Eric A. Hanushek & John F. Kain & Steven G. Rivkin, 2009. "New Evidence about Brown v. Board of Education: The Complex Effects of School Racial Composition on Achievement," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 27(3), pages 349-383, July.
    3. Kevin Lang, 1986. "A Language Theory of Discrimination," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 101(2), pages 363-382.
    4. Donna S. Rothstein, 1995. "Do Female Faculty Influence Female Students' Educational and Labor Market Attainments?," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 48(3), pages 515-530, April.
    5. Thomas S. Dee, 2005. "A Teacher Like Me: Does Race, Ethnicity, or Gender Matter?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(2), pages 158-165, May.
    6. Thomas S. Dee, 2007. "Teachers and the Gender Gaps in Student Achievement," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 42(3).
    7. Petra E. Todd & Kenneth I. Wolpin, 2003. "On The Specification and Estimation of The Production Function for Cognitive Achievement," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 113(485), pages 3-33, February.
    8. Ronald G. Ehrenberg & Daniel D. Goldhaber & Dominic J. Brewer, 1995. "Do Teachers' Race, Gender, and Ethnicity Matter? Evidence from the National Educational Longitudinal Study of 1988," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 48(3), pages 547-561, April.
    9. Brandice J. Canes & Harvey S. Rosen, 1995. "Following in Her Footsteps? Faculty Gender Composition and Women's Choices of College Majors," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 48(3), pages 486-504, April.
    10. Hanushek, Eric A, 1986. "The Economics of Schooling: Production and Efficiency in Public Schools," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 24(3), pages 1141-1177, September.
    11. Victor Lavy, 2004. "Do Gender Stereotypes Reduce Girls' Human Capital Outcomes? Evidence from a Natural Experiment," NBER Working Papers 10678, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Thomas S. Dee, 2004. "Teachers, Race, and Student Achievement in a Randomized Experiment," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(1), pages 195-210, February.
    13. Karen E. Dynan & Cecilia Elena Rouse, 1997. "The Underrepresentation of Women in Economics: A Study of Undergraduate Economics Students," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(4), pages 350-368, December.
    14. Georgie D. M. Hyde, 1988. "The Role of Women," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: South Korea, chapter 6, pages 100-113, Palgrave Macmillan.
    15. Eric P. Bettinger & Bridget Terry Long, 2005. "Do Faculty Serve as Role Models? The Impact of Instructor Gender on Female Students," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(2), pages 152-157, May.
    16. Kevin N. Rask & Elizabeth M. Bailey, 2002. "Are Faculty Role Models? Evidence from Major Choice in an Undergraduate Institution," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(2), pages 99-124, June.
    17. Sara J. Solnick, 1995. "Changes in Women's Majors from Entrance to Graduation at Women's and Coeducational Colleges," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 48(3), pages 505-514, April.
    18. Ehrenberg, Ronald G. & Brewer, Dominic J., 1995. "Did teachers' verbal ability and race matter in the 1960s? Coleman revisited," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 14(1), pages 1-21, March.
    19. David Neumark & Rosella Gardecki, 1998. "Women Helping Women? Role Model and Mentoring Effects on Female Ph.D. Students in Economics," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 33(1), pages 220-246.
    20. John Ashworth & J. Lynne Evans, 2001. "Modeling Student Subject Choice at Secondary and Tertiary Level: A Cross-Section Study," The Journal of Economic Education, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(4), pages 311-320, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Griffith, Amanda L. & Main, Joyce B., 2019. "First impressions in the classroom: How do class characteristics affect student grades and majors?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 125-137.
    2. Puhani, Patrick A., 2018. "Do boys benefit from male teachers in elementary school? Evidence from administrative panel data," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 340-354.
    3. Kato, Takao & Song, Yang, 2018. "An Advisor like Me: Does Gender Matter?," IZA Discussion Papers 11575, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Florian Hoffmann & Philip Oreopoulos, 2009. "A Professor Like Me: The Influence of Instructor Gender on College Achievement," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 44(2).
    5. Lusher, Lester & Campbell, Doug & Carrell, Scott, 2018. "TAs like me: Racial interactions between graduate teaching assistants and undergraduates," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 203-224.
    6. Thomas S. Dee, 2007. "Teachers and the Gender Gaps in Student Achievement," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 42(3).
    7. Egalite, Anna J. & Kisida, Brian & Winters, Marcus A., 2015. "Representation in the classroom: The effect of own-race teachers on student achievement," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 44-52.
    8. Scott E. Carrell & Marianne E. Page & James E. West, 2010. "Sex and Science: How Professor Gender Perpetuates the Gender Gap," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 125(3), pages 1101-1144.
    9. Amanda L. Griffith, 2014. "Faculty Gender in the College Classroom: Does It Matter for Achievement and Major Choice?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 81(1), pages 211-231, July.
    10. Price, Joshua, 2010. "The effect of instructor race and gender on student persistence in STEM fields," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(6), pages 901-910, December.
    11. Hoffman, Florian & Oreopoulos, Philip, 2009. "A Professor Like Me: Influence of Professor Gender on University Achievement," CLSSRN working papers clsrn_admin-2009-13, Vancouver School of Economics, revised 02 Feb 2009.
    12. Griffith, Amanda L. & Main, Joyce B., 2021. "The role of the teaching assistant: Female role models in the classroom," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    13. Hisanobu Kakizawa, 2017. "The Effects of Student-Teacher Gender Matching on Students f Performance in Junior High Schools in Japan," Discussion Papers in Economics and Business 17-29, Osaka University, Graduate School of Economics.
    14. Takao Kato & Yang Song, 2022. "Advising, gender, and performance: Evidence from a university with exogenous adviser–student gender match," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 60(1), pages 121-141, January.
    15. Anthony LokTing Yim, 2023. "How Early Morning Classes Change Academic Trajectories: Evidence from a Natural Experiment," Purdue University Economics Working Papers 1334, Purdue University, Department of Economics.
    16. Shulamit Kahn & Donna Ginther, 2017. "Women and STEM," NBER Working Papers 23525, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Hani Mansour & Daniel I. Rees & Bryson M. Rintala & Nathan N. Wozny, 2022. "The Effects of Professor Gender on the Postgraduation Outcomes of Female Students," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 75(3), pages 693-715, May.
    18. Ammermüller, Andreas & Dolton, Peter J., 2006. "Pupil-teacher gender interaction effects on scholastic outcomes in England and the USA," ZEW Discussion Papers 06-060, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    19. Buddin, Richard & Zamarro, Gema, 2009. "Teacher qualifications and student achievement in urban elementary schools," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 103-115, September.
    20. Behncke, Stefanie & Frölich, Markus & Lechner, Michael, 2008. "A Caseworker Like Me: Does the Similarity between Unemployed and Caseworker Increase Job Placements?," IZA Discussion Papers 3437, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:labeco:v:15:y:2008:i:1:p:37-53. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/labeco .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.