Secondary Education and Coping with a Pandemic: Experimental Evidence from Ghana

Ghana Education Health & Nutrition

Secondary Education and Coping with a Pandemic: Experimental Evidence from Ghana

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Researchers

Esther Duflo, Pascaline Dupas

Abstract

This project aims to establish the causal impact of education on ability to cope with both the sanitary crisis and the economic crisis generated by a pandemic. We propose to leverage a randomized controlled trial initiated in Ghana in 2008, in which 682 adolescents from a sample of 2,064 received a scholarship for secondary school. The scholarship offer led to a large increase in secondary school enrollment. Since 2008, we have tracked this cohort, with an attrition rate as of 2019 of only 5 percent. We are uniquely positioned to exploit the random variation in educational attainment in our sample to estimate the causal impact of secondary education on resilience to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Project Outcomes of Interest

awareness about the health threat and of prevention methods; economic impact for respondents (using our 2019 survey data as baseline); and how they differ based on access to secondary education, and by gender
 

Impact Goals

  • Build resilience and protect the financial health of families and individuals
  • Reduce COVID-19 transmission rates

Project Data Collection Mode

  • CATI (Computer-assisted telephone interviewing)

Results Status

No Results Yet