Gender Matters: Causal Effects of Single-Sex Schools on College Attendance

Hyunjoon Park, University of Pennsylvania
Jere Behrman, University of Pennsylvania

Interest has increased in the potentials of single-sex public education. However, there is not consensus on the effects of single-sex education because of student selection of school type. We exploit a unique feature of Korean education, the random assignment of students to single-sex versus coeducational high schools, to assess causal effects of single-sex schools on college attendance. Our estimates show significantly positive effects of both all-boys and all-girls schools on four-year college attendance and negative effects on two-year college attendance. The effect of all-boys schools is largely explained by the larger share of male teachers in all-boys schools than coeducational schools, but the share of female teachers does not explain the effect of all-girls schools.