TY  - JOUR
AU  - Hoekstra, Mark
AU  - Mouganie, Pierre
AU  - Wang, Yaojing
TI  - Peer Quality and the Academic Benefits to Attending Better Schools
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 22337
PY  - 2016
Y2  - June 2016
DO  - 10.3386/w22337
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w22337
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w22337.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Mark Hoekstra
Department of Economics
Texas A&M University
3087 Allen Building
4228 TAMU
College Station, TX  77843
Tel: (979) 845-7302
E-Mail: markhoekstra@tamu.edu

Pierre Mouganie
American University of Beirut
P.O.Box 11-0236 / Department of Economics
Riad El-Solh
Beirut 1107 2020
Lebanon
Tel: 0096170958156
E-Mail: pm10@aub.edu.lb

Yaojing Wang
Department of Economics
Texas A&M University
4228 TAMU
College Station, TX  77843
E-Mail: h0484022@tamu.edu
AB  - Despite strong demand for attending high schools with better peers, there is mixed evidence on whether doing so improves academic outcomes.  We estimate the cognitive returns to high school quality using administrative data on a high-stakes college entrance exam in China. To overcome selection bias, we use a regression discontinuity design that compares applicants barely above and below high school admission thresholds. Results indicate that while peer quality improves significantly across all sets of admission cutoffs, the only increase in performance occurs from attending Tier I high schools.  Further evidence suggests that the returns to high school quality are driven by teacher quality, rather than peer quality or class size.
ER  -