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Three Essays On The Economics Of Education, Tianheng Wang

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation consists of three essays related to the field of economics of education. In chapter 2, using data from middle school students in China and exploiting the random assignment of students to classrooms within schools, I investigate the causal effect of peer groups on students’ scholastic achievement. I find that female student proportion in the classroom positively affects male students’ test scores and that the education level of peers’ parents improves the academic achievement of both male and female students. Students with highly-educated parents benefit more from classmates with higher parental education compared to students with relatively lower parental …