IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/umb/econwp/09104.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Family Separation and Reunification as a Factor in the Educational Success of Immigrant Children

Author

Listed:

Abstract

We find that family separation during migration has a negative impact on the educational success of immigrant children in U.S. schools. Children separated from parents during migration are more likely to be behind others their age in school, are more likely to repeat a grade, and are more likely to drop out of high school. The negative impact of separation during migration on educational success is largest for Latin American immigrants, for children separated from their mothers (as opposed to fathers), for those whose parents have lived in the United States illegally, and for those who were separated from their parents at older ages and reunited with parents as teenagers.

Suggested Citation

  • Tim H. Gindling & Sara Z. Poggio, 2008. "Family Separation and Reunification as a Factor in the Educational Success of Immigrant Children," UMBC Economics Department Working Papers 09-104, UMBC Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:umb:econwp:09104
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.umbc.edu/economics/wpapers/wp_09_104_FinalReport-FamilySeparationandReunification.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Amuedo-Dorantes, Catalina & Georges, Annie & Pozo, Susan, 2008. "Migration, Remittances and Children’s Schooling in Haiti," IZA Discussion Papers 3657, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. David Deming & Susan Dynarski, 2008. "The Lengthening of Childhood," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(3), pages 71-92, Summer.
    3. Anne Case & I-Fen Lin & Sara McLanahan, 2000. "Educational Attainment in Blended Families," NBER Working Papers 7874, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Robert Haveman & Barbara Wolfe, 1995. "The Determinants of Children's Attainments: A Review of Methods and Findings," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 33(4), pages 1829-1878, December.
    5. David McKenzie & Hillel Rapoport, 2011. "Can migration reduce educational attainment? Evidence from Mexico," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 24(4), pages 1331-1358, October.
    6. Richard Akresh & Redstone Akresh, 2011. "Using Achievement Tests to Measure Language Assimilation and Language Bias among the Children of Immigrants," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 46(3), pages 647-667.
    7. Lofstrom, Magnus, 2007. "Why Are Hispanic and African-American Dropout Rates So High?," IZA Discussion Papers 3265, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Miranda, Alfonso, 2007. "Migrant Networks, Migrant Selection, and High School Graduation in Mexico," IZA Discussion Papers 3204, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Fitzpatrick Maria D, 2008. "Starting School at Four: The Effect of Universal Pre-Kindergarten on Children's Academic Achievement," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 8(1), pages 1-40, November.
    10. Cascio, Elizabeth U., 2005. "School Progression and the Grade Distribution of Students: Evidence from the Current Population Survey," IZA Discussion Papers 1747, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
    11. Krista Perreira & Kathleen Harris & Dohoon Lee, 2006. "Making it in America: High school completion by immigrant and native youth," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 43(3), pages 511-536, August.
    12. Jasso, Guillermina & Massey, Douglas S. & Rosenzweig, Mark R. & Smith, James P., 2008. "From Illegal to Legal: Estimating Previous Illegal Experience among New Legal Immigrants to the United States," IZA Discussion Papers 3441, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Stephen V. Cameron & James J. Heckman, 2001. "The Dynamics of Educational Attainment for Black, Hispanic, and White Males," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 109(3), pages 455-499, June.
    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. Gindling, T. H. & Poggio, Sara Z., 2010. "The Effect of Family Separation and Reunification on the Educational Success of Immigrant Children in the United States," IZA Discussion Papers 4887, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Jia Wu & Junsen Zhang, 2017. "The Effect of Parental Absence on Child Development in Rural China," Asian Economic Policy Review, Japan Center for Economic Research, vol. 12(1), pages 117-134, January.
    3. Michele Battisti & Antonio Francesco Gravina & Andrea Mario Lavezzi & Giuseppe Maggio & Giorgio Tortorici, 2024. "Educational Take-off and the Role of Wealth," Discussion Papers 2024/302, Dipartimento di Economia e Management (DEM), University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
    4. Adam Sawyer, 2016. "Is Money Enough?: The Effect of Migrant Remittances on Parental Aspirations and Youth Educational Attainment in Rural Mexico," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(1), pages 231-266, March.
    5. Checchi, Daniele & Fiorio, Carlo V. & Leonardi, Marco, 2013. "Intergenerational persistence of educational attainment in Italy," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 118(1), pages 229-232.
    6. Daniele Checchi & Luca Flabbi, 2013. "Intergenerational Mobility and Schooling Decisions in Germany and Italy: The Impact of Secondary School Tracks," Rivista di Politica Economica, SIPI Spa, issue 3, pages 7-57, July-Sept.
    7. Marco Francesconi & Stephen Jenkins & Thomas Siedler, 2010. "Childhood family structure and schooling outcomes: evidence for Germany," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 23(3), pages 1073-1103, June.
    8. Altonji Joseph G & Villanueva Ernesto, 2007. "The Marginal Propensity to Spend on Adult Children," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 1-52, February.
    9. Huang, Jin & Guo, Baorong & Kim, Youngmi & Sherraden, Michael, 2010. "Parental income, assets, borrowing constraints and children's post-secondary education," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 585-594, April.
    10. Sarma, Vengadeshvaran J. & Parinduri, Rasyad A., 2016. "What happens to children's education when their parents emigrate? Evidence from Sri Lanka," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 94-102.
    11. Raaum, Oddbjørn & Rogstad, Jon & Røed, Knut & Westlie, Lars, 2009. "Young and out: An application of a prospects-based concept of social exclusion," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 173-187, January.
    12. Elena Arias Ortiz & Catherine Dehon, 2008. "What are the Factors of Success at University? A Case Study in Belgium," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 54(2), pages 121-148.
    13. Alejandra Cattaneo & Sandra Hanslin & Rainer Winkelmann, 2007. "The Apple Falls Increasingly Far: Parent-Child Correlation in Schooling and the Growth of Post-Secondary Education in Switzerland," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics (SJES), Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES), vol. 143(II), pages 133-153, June.
    14. Rossella Iraci Capuccinello, 2014. "Determinants and timing of dropping out decisions: evidence from the UK FE sector," Working Papers 15742191, Lancaster University Management School, Economics Department.
    15. Jesus Cañas & Roberto Coronado & Pia M. Orrenius & Madeline Zavodny, 2010. "Do remittances boost economic development? Evidence from Mexican states," Working Papers 1007, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
    16. Magalhães, Graziella & Turchick, David, 2022. "Growth and inequality under different hierarchical education regimes," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    17. Martins, Lurdes & Veiga, Paula, 2010. "Do inequalities in parents' education play an important role in PISA students' mathematics achievement test score disparities?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 29(6), pages 1016-1033, December.
    18. Dustmann, Christian & Glitz, Albrecht, 2011. "Migration and Education," Handbook of the Economics of Education, in: Erik Hanushek & Stephen Machin & Ludger Woessmann (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Education, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 327-439, Elsevier.
    19. Massimiliano BRATTI, 2002. "Parents' Current Income, Long-term Characteristics and Children's Education: Evidence from the 1970 British Cohort," Working Papers 174, Universita' Politecnica delle Marche (I), Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali.
    20. Nguyen, Cuong Viet & Vu, Linh Hoang, 2014. "Should Parents Work Away from or Close to Home? The Effect of Temporary Parental Absence on Child Poverty and Children’s Time Use in Vietnam," MPRA Paper 52877, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    migration; education; children; family separation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
    • J12 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure
    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth

    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:umb:econwp:09104. 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: Christelle Viauroux (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/edumbus.html .

    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.