DEC Lecture Series: Aspirations, Stereotypes and Educational Choices

  Featured Speaker
  (May 6, 2019)
  Eliana La Ferrara

  Bocconi University

Aspirations, Stereotypes and Educational Choices

About this Lecture

How do negatively stereotyped groups make educational choices? How do the stereotypes of teachers and peers impact their performance? The talk will bring evidence from different countries and contexts to speak to the above questions. First, it will show that high-achieving immigrant children in Italy’s tracked school system under-aspire compared to native students and will discuss the impact of a large-scale, randomized intervention providing tutoring and career counseling to high-ability immigrant students. Second, it will analyze the role played by teachers’ bias and show that making teachers aware of their negative stereotypes towards immigrants leads to a change in their grading policy. Finally, it will discuss the role of peers’ racial stereotypes in South Africa, and discuss how inter-group contact affects stereotypes and educational performance of different groups.