Ten-Year Impacts of Burkina Faso’s BRIGHT Program

IV: FINDINGS
MATHEMATICA POLICY RESEARCH
suggest that, at least for the older students, grade progression may be one of the primary
mechanisms through which the BRIGHT program improves test scores.
Figure IV.5. Ten-year impacts of the BRIGHT program on highest grade
achieved and test scores, by age
1.8
0.6
Estimated impacts on highest grade achieved
1.5
1.2
0.9
0.6
0.3
0
-0.3
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
-0.1
5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23
Age
Estimated impacts on test scores
Highest grade achieved
Test scores
Sources: Mathematica household survey (2015) and Mathematica school survey (2015).
The next question is, then, why do BRIGHT schools cause students to progress farther than
they otherwise would? In Table IV.6, we present estimated differences in measures of students’
ages relative to their grades. As shown in the first row, only 37.2 percent of students in
unselected villages can be considered to be the appropriate age for their grade, compared to
percent in selected villages. 35 The next two rows show that the age inappropriateness is related to
students being too old rather than too young for their grades. Students in unselected villages are,
on average, 1.42 years “off-grade;” students in selected villages are about one- quarter of a year
closer to being the right age for their grade. One reason that students in selected villages are
more likely to be on grade seems to be that they are more likely to start school on time and at a
younger age—closer to the appropriate age for starting school (Table IV.6).
35
Students are expected to start 1st grade at age 7. So, students are classified as age appropriate if their age is within
a year of their grade plus six years.
46