Bolsa Escola

During our panel, the Bolsa escola (later Bolsa familia) conditional cash transfer program was rolled out across Brazil. Data on the presence of the program at a given school was first collected in 2001: by 2004, nearly every school was responding positively (see Table 50 in Appendix A.3). Glewwe and Kassouf (2012) show that

Bolsa escola increased enrolment and promotion rates and reduced dropout. If the adoption of the cycles policy is correlated with availability of the Bolsa program - for instance, if some municipalities are ‘early adopters’ - this could confound our estimates.

Table 50: Share of municipalities with Bolsa students

Year Mean 1999 . 2000 . 2001 0.469 2002 0.961 2003 0.983 2004 0.995 2005 0.995 2006 0.999

Source: Censo Escolar, authors’ calculations. Mean values across municipalities.

To explore this possibility, we re-estimate our enrolment, promotion and dropout equations, controlling for the presence of the program in that municipality. While we present a set of school-level results for comparability (see Tables 51 and 52), we do not replicate the full set of results for schools. Given that students can sort themselves across schools in response to both the cycle policy and the Bolsa program, it would be difficult or impossible to interpret any differences that emerged. As the

survey simply asked whether Bolsa escola exists at the school, but not how many students were eligible or enrolled, we follow Glewwe and Kassouf (2012) by using presence of the program as a binary indicator. We aggregate this at the municipality level, with Bolsa equal to one if any schools report the program.

Because data onBolsa escola were first collected in 2001, the sample on which we estimate these equations is smaller than our baseline sample. To compare estimates with and without the Bolsa control, we first re-estimate our primary specification using only the subsample of municipalities with a valid Bolsa observation. We then estimate the same equation, with the addition of the Bolsa dummy variable.

Tables 53 and 54 present the results on enrolment. Compared to our baseline specification (see Table 15), restricting the sample to the Bolsa years does change our estimates. While our baseline specification shows no effect of the cycles policy on the natural log of enrolment, Table 53suggests that, restricting to the sample to Bolsa years, cycles may have a negative effect on the enrolment of older children. When we compare these estimates to Table54, however, we see that the addition of a dummy variable forBolsa escola has only negligible effects on our estimated cycles coefficients: the effect is purely due to the sample restriction.

Tables 55 and 56 repeat this approach for passing rates, while Table 57 and 58 do the same for dropouts. In both cases, we observe only the slightest changes in estimates when controlling for theBolsa program.

Table 51: School-level student flows (no lags): promoted

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Grade 8 Cycles 0.0713∗∗∗ 0.0220∗∗∗ 0.0211∗∗∗ 0.0191∗∗∗ 0.00438∗∗∗0.0260∗∗∗ -

0.00436∗∗∗

0.0248∗∗∗ (0.00170) (0.00169) (0.00156) (0.00163) (0.00158) (0.00189) (0.00165) (0.00308) Obs 1033310 1017858 990673 932982 353542 328867 310258 292118

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by school. Each column presents results from a fixed effect school-level regression. Controls (not shown): dummy for location (rural or urban), a dummy for jurisdiction (state, municipal or private), total number of teachers, number of teachers at the primary level, number and education score of teachers teaching grades 1-4 (for columns (1)-(4)) or teaching grades 5-8 (for columns (5)-(8)), and state-year interactions.

∗ _{p <0.10,}∗∗ _{p <0.05,}∗∗∗ _{p <0.01.}

Table 52: School-level student flows (no lags): dropped

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Grade 8 Cycles 0.00303∗∗∗- 0.0019∗∗ 0.00541∗∗∗- 0.0024∗∗∗ 0.00847∗∗∗- 0.00011 0.0121∗∗∗ 0.00415∗∗∗ (0.000905)(0.000725)(0.000804)(0.000798)(0.00104) (0.000934)(0.00113) (0.00105) Obs 1033310 1017858 990673 932982 353542 328867 310258 292118

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by school. Each column presents results from a fixed effect school-level regression. Controls (not shown): dummy for location (rural or urban), a dummy for jurisdiction (state, municipal or private), total number of teachers, number of teachers at the primary level, number and education score of teachers teaching grades 1-4 (for columns (1)-(4)) or teaching grades 5-8 (for columns (5)-(8)), and state-year interactions.

Table 53: Municipalities: ln total enrolments (no lag) - Bolsa sample

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6)

Age 7 Age 8 Age 9 Age 10 Age 11 Age 12 Cycles -0.0125 0.00411 0.00435 0.00653 -0.00867∗∗ -0.00581

(0.00988) (0.00429) (0.00510) (0.00406) (0.00391) (0.00396) Observations33012 33029 33029 33029 33029 33029

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by municipality. Each column presents results from a fixed

effect municipality-level regression. Sample is restricted to those municipality-years withBolsadata.

Controls (not shown): the number of schools in the municipality, the number of schools by location and jurisdiction, population and municipal GDP in natural logs and in levels, the number and education scores of teachers teaching grades 1-4 and 5-8, and state-time interactions.

∗ _{p <0.10,}∗∗ _{p <0.05,}∗∗∗ _{p <0.01.}

Table 54: Municipalities: ln total enrolments (no lag)

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6)

Age 7 Age 8 Age 9 Age 10 Age 11 Age 12 Cycles -0.0125 0.00409 0.00433 0.00651 -0.00868∗∗ -0.00582

(0.00988) (0.00428) (0.00510) (0.00406) (0.00391) (0.00396) bolsa 0.00963 0.00752∗∗ 0.00993∗∗ 0.00644∗ 0.00349 0.00660∗∗ (0.00640) (0.00367) (0.00388) (0.00338) (0.00355) (0.00332) Observations33012 33029 33029 33029 33029 33029

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by municipality. Each column presents results from a

fixed effect municipality-level regression. Controls (not shown): the number of schools in the

municipality, the number of schools by location and jurisdiction, population and municipal GDP in natural logs and in levels, the number and education scores of teachers teaching grades 1-4 and 5-8, and state-time interactions.

Table 55: Municipality student flows (no lags) - Bolsa sample: promoted

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Grade 8 Cycles 0.0412∗∗∗ 0.00315 0.0211∗∗∗ -

0.00007

0.0263∗∗∗ 0.0221∗∗∗ 0.0205∗∗∗ 0.0157∗∗∗ (0.00515) (0.00435) (0.00446) (0.00425) (0.00431) (0.00435) (0.00436) (0.00506) Obs 27517 27514 27519 27520 27522 27520 27515 27509

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by municipality. Each column presents results from a fixed

effect municipality-level regression. Sample is restricted to those municipality-years withBolsadata.

Controls (not shown): the number of schools in the municipality, the number of schools by location and jurisdiction, population and municipal GDP in natural logs and in levels, the number and education scores of teachers teaching grades 1-4 and 5-8, and state-time interactions.

∗ _{p <0.10,}∗∗ _{p <0.05,}∗∗∗ _{p <0.01.}

Table 56: Municipality student flows (no lags): promoted

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Grade 8 Cycles 0.0412∗∗∗ 0.00313 0.0211∗∗∗ - 0.00009 0.0262∗∗∗ 0.0221∗∗∗ 0.0205∗∗∗ 0.0156∗∗∗ (0.00516) (0.00435) (0.00446) (0.00425) (0.00431) (0.00435) (0.00435) (0.00506) bolsa 0.00264 0.00424 0.00465 0.00408 0.00326 0.00310 0.00452 0.00565 (0.00415) (0.00338) (0.00342) (0.00369) (0.00331) (0.00333) (0.00322) (0.00357) Obs 27517 27514 27519 27520 27522 27520 27515 27509

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by municipality. Each column presents results from a

fixed effect municipality-level regression. Controls (not shown): the number of schools in the

municipality, the number of schools by location and jurisdiction, population and municipal GDP in natural logs and in levels, the number and education scores of teachers teaching grades 1-4 and 5-8, and state-time interactions.

Table 57: Municipality student flows (no lags) - Bolsa sample: dropped

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Grade 8 Cycles 0.000607 0.00190 0.000398 - 0.00112 - 0.00213 - 0.004∗∗ - 0.00099 - 0.007∗∗∗ (0.00166) (0.00135) (0.00142) (0.00130) (0.00182) (0.00181) (0.00187) (0.00193) Obs 27517 27514 27519 27520 27522 27520 27515 27509

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by municipality. Each column presents results from a fixed

effect municipality-level regression. Sample is restricted to those municipality-years withBolsadata.

Controls (not shown): the number of schools in the municipality, the number of schools by location and jurisdiction, population and municipal GDP in natural logs and in levels, the number and education scores of teachers teaching grades 1-4 and 5-8, and state-time interactions.

∗ _{p <0.10,}∗∗ _{p <0.05,}∗∗∗ _{p <0.01.}

Table 58: Municipality student flows (no lags): dropped

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Grade 1 Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6 Grade 7 Grade 8 Cycles 0.000609 0.00190 0.000407 - 0.00112 - 0.00213 - 0.004∗∗ - 0.00099 - 0.007∗∗∗ (0.00166) (0.00135) (0.00142) (0.00130) (0.00182) (0.00181) (0.00187) (0.00193) bolsa - 0.00057 - 0.00104 - 0.00197 - 0.00006 - 0.00001 - 0.00028 - 0.0005 - 0.0046∗∗∗ (0.00150) (0.00118) (0.00128) (0.00129) (0.00164) (0.00152) (0.00167) (0.00161) Obs 27517 27514 27519 27520 27522 27520 27515 27509

Standard errors in parentheses, clustered by municipality. Each column presents results from a

fixed effect municipality-level regression. Controls (not shown): the number of schools in the

municipality, the number of schools by location and jurisdiction, population and municipal GDP in natural logs and in levels, the number and education scores of teachers teaching grades 1-4 and 5-8, and state-time interactions.