Complement or Substitute?

The Effect of
Technology on Student Achievement in India

June 3, 2008

Leigh L. Linden1
Columbia University, MIT Jameel Poverty Action Lab, IZA

Abstract: Using a pair of randomized evaluations, I evaluate a computer assisted

learning program designed to reinforce students understanding of material presented in
class. The program was implemented in both an in-school and out-of-school model
allowing me to assess different strategies for integrating the technology into the existing
schools. The effect of the program critically depends on the method of implementation.
The program was a poor substitute for the teacher delivered curriculum and as a result,
the in-school model caused students to learn significantly less than they otherwise would
have learned (-0.57 standard deviations). When implemented as a complement to the
normal program in the out-of-school model, however, the program generated average
gains of 0.28 standard deviations reflecting small positive (but statistically insignificant)
gains by most students and large positive gains by the weakest and older students in the
class (from 0.4 to 0.69 standard deviations). The results emphasize the importance of
understanding how new technologies and teaching methods both interact with existing
resources and differentially affect students with different needs and abilities.
Keywords: Education, Development, Computer Assisted Learning
JEL Codes: I21, I28, O15

1
As is typical of an undertaking of this magnitude, this project would not have been completed without the
assistance of a number of people. Of the many who assisted in this research project, a few made especially
important contributions. Pankaj Jain and Zalak Kavi of Gyan Shala are responsible for the management of
the data collection activities and the intervention. Nandit Bhatt provided very valuable research assistance,
both conducting field interviews with teachers and assisting with data analysis. I am indebted to Esther
Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee for helpful suggestions and comments. The intervention and evaluation were
funded by InfoDev. All errors are, of course, my own, and any correspondence can be sent to me at
[email protected].
I. Introduction

Many have considered the use of computers as a prime opportunity to improve the

productivity of classrooms. By providing a dynamic learning experience delivered to

children on an individual basis, computers could provide an engaging learning experience

tailored to the needs of individual students (see for example, Anderson, Boyle, and

Reiser, 1985; Schofield, Eurich-Fulcer, and Britt, 1994). Slower students could practice

remedial drills and review material that they have yet to master. Stronger students, on the

other hand, could move quickly through additional material, improving their

understanding unencumbered by the pace of their slower peers. Within this image,

computers can deliver educational inputs that teachers alone could not cost-effectively

provide.

These promises are particularly important in the developing country context.

Although many countries are making substantial gains towards meeting the Millennium

Development Goal of universal primary education by 2015, the quality of schools serving

most of these populations remains extremely low (Filmer, Hasan, and Pritchett, 2006). In

India, for example, where enrollment rates have increased significantly in recent years, a

recent countrywide survey of rural children (ASER, 2007) found that only 58.3 percent of

children in fifth grade could read at the second grade level. Similarly, only half of 9-10

year old children who are attending school could demonstrate basic numeric problem

solving skills.

Unfortunately, the majority of the general evidence on the effectiveness of large-

scale efforts to place computing resources in the classrooms is at best ambiguous with

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most studies finding small if any effects.2 Angrist and Lavy (2002) assess the impact of

an Israeli school computerization program and find no evidence that the program raised

students’ test scores. They also find some evidence that the program may have hurt

fourth grade students’ math scores. Goolsbee and Guryan (2002) evaluate a U.S.

program designed to subsidize school use of the Internet. They find no affect on student

performance. Leuven, Lindhal, and Webbink (2004) evaluate the effect of computer use

in the Netherlands finding results similar to those of Angrist and Lavy (2002). The

exception in this literature is Machin, McNally, and Silva (2006) who assess the effects

of ICT investments in England and find a positive impact on student performance,

particularly in English.

The major limitation of these studies is that they treat computing resources as a

general educational input. So, while these studies may capture the effectiveness of the

average application of computing technology, they cannot speak to the potential

effectiveness of individual programs. It may be, for example, that there are potentially

effective methods of using computers in the classroom that have just not been

implemented on a large enough scale to be measured through such general studies.

A few new studies have begun to estimate the effects of individual programs

using randomized evaluation techniques, but even here the results are still ambiguous.

Dynarski et al. (2007) evaluate several programs in U.S. schools and find no evidence of

effects on students’ math and reading scores. Rouse and Krueger (2004) evaluate a

reading program in several urban schools in a city in the Northeast of the U.S. and find

no evidence that the program generates improvements in students’ general language or

2
Kirkpatrick and Cuban (1998) conduct a survey of the existing education research and conclude that the
evidence is at best mixed.

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reading skills. Barrow, Markman, and Rouse (2007) evaluate a program designed to

teach algebra and pre-algebra in three U.S. urban school districts, finding that the

program improved students’ math performance on state administered standardized tests

by 0.17 standard deviations.

There are also two evaluations that use similar methodology in the context of a

developing country. The evidence is more consistent and suggests that the application of

technologies that change pedagogical methods can have very large effects. Bannerjee,

Cole, Duflo, and Linden (2007) evaluate the effects of a math program in Vadodara,

India finding that the program increases student performance by 0.47 standard deviations

on average. Similarly, He, Linden, and MacLeod (2008) evaluate an English language

program in Maharashtra, India finding that the program improves students’ English

scores by 0.3 standard deviations on average.

One limitation of these studies is that they do not consider variation in the way

that the individual programs interact with existing resources within the classroom. Most

of these studies test individual or multiple interventions without considering, for

example, whether or not variations of the individual program might better suit the

particular schools involved. Because any intervention rearranges the structure of pre-

existing inputs within the classroom, these interactions could be particularly significant.

For example, if computers substitute for a more productive arrangement of resources,

students may learn less than if the same program was used, instead, to complement

existing efforts. This variation in relative productivity could explain some of the

inconsistency in the existing literature. For example, it might explain why programs that

substitute for teacher instruction in developed countries where the quality of instruction is

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high have provided more ambiguous results while similar programs in less well-

functioning school systems, like those in India, have generated stronger and more

consistently positive results.3

Working with the Gyan Shala program, an NGO in Gujarat, India, I attempt both

to evaluate a novel computer assisted learning program and to do so in a way that allows

us to assess the effectiveness of different strategies for the implementation of the

program. First, unlike these previous studies, I explicitly take the classroom’s existing

resources into account when implementing the intervention. Operating in a relatively

well-functioning network of NGO-run schools, I first test the effectiveness of the

program as a substitute to the regular teaching methods by using the computers in a pull-

out in-school program and as a complement by using the computers as an out-of-school

time program. In addition, unlike most previous studies, I evaluate a program that is

explicitly designed to reinforce the material taught in the normal curriculum. In other

words, unlike previous programs, the Gyan Shala model focuses on changing the way

that material is presented to children within the standard curriculum, rather than allowing

children to move at their own pace through additional or more advanced material.

Overall, I find that the program as a whole does little to improve students’ math

scores. However, I find that the method of implementation matters significantly for the

effectiveness of the program. When implemented as a substitute (the pull-out version) to

the regular inputs, the program proves much less productive, causing students on average

to learn 0.57 standard deviations less than they otherwise would. When implemented as a

complement to the existing arrangement of inputs (the out-of-school time version), I find

3
In fact, both Angrist and Lavy (2002) and Leuven, Oosterbeek, and Webbink (2004) hypothesize that
such substitution may be the cause of the few negative estimates they find in their analysis.

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evidence that the program is generally effective, increasing students’ test scores by 0.28

standard deviations. When implemented as a complement to existing resources, the

program also has differential effects on students. Poorly performing students and older

students experience gains of 0.4 to 0.69 standard deviations in math scores, significantly

more than their higher achieving peers. Finally, I find that, given the costs and average

impacts, the pull-out program is as cost-effective as many other interventions evaluated

in the developing country context.

These results suggest that researchers evaluating the effectiveness of new teaching

techniques and classroom resources need to consider carefully the way that the new

inputs will interact with existing resources and whether that change meets the specific

needs of individual types of students. For education and development policy, the results

emphasize the importance of conducting rigorous evaluations of educational programs

since even small changes to the learning environment can cause significant declines in

student performance.

The remainder of the paper is organized as follows. Section Two provides a brief

overview of the intervention and the methods of implementation. Section Three provides

a description of the general research design and statistical methodology, and Section Four

provides the statistical results of the evaluation, and in Section Five, I assess the cost

effectiveness of the out-of-school time intervention relative to other education programs

that have been assessed in developing countries. I conclude in Section Six.

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II. Gyan Shala and the Gyan Shala CAL Program

A. Gyan Shala

Gyan Shala is a project of Education Support Organization, an Indian NGO that aims to

develop a new system of solutions for delivering basic-primary education to first through

third grade children in poor rural and urban families. The organization attempts to target

families whose children would otherwise attend poorly performing public schools or no

school at all. The program is based in the state of Gujarat in Western India.

The core innovation of the Gyan Shala learning model is the use of a rigorous,

tightly scripted curriculum and the employment of women from the local communities.

Like many other programs that employ similarly skilled men and women for educational

purposes (see for example the Balsakhi program in Bannerjee, Cole, Duflo, and Linden,

2007), these women would not meet the requirements for employment in the government

public schools. The minimum requirement is that teachers pass at least the 10th grade.

Recruited teachers are trained prior to the beginning of the academic year. Gyan

Shala trains these women in a very carefully constructed curriculum that proscribes the

teachers’ activities in 15 minute blocks of time. The material covers all of the basic

requirements of the official state curriculum (the Minimum Levels of Learning). The

school runs the duration of the normal Indian academic year, but students attend school

for only three hours a day. Combined with a careful oversight system and Gyan Shala

supplied books and learning materials, this system offers a high-quality, well-structured

learning environment at a cost of $40 per student per year.

From the perspective of the student, Gyan Shala emphasizes regular participation

and academic achievement. Gyan Shala is run as a non-profit organization, and the fee

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structure is meant to encourage families to take the children’s education seriously.

Despite actual costs of $40 per student per year, students are charged only 30 Rupees per

month (about $0.75) and the fee is waived if the family is deemed too poor to pay.

Because the schools are run by women from the local community, the teachers are able to

interact directly with childrens’ parents and more carefully monitor the students’ needs.

Typically, a child enters grade one at an age of at least five and after completing three

years of Gyan Shala classes, the child is expected to join grade four in a public or

recognized private school.

Gyan Shala started in 2000, and as of the 2004-05 academic year, was running

165 classes, of which 95 were located in the urban slums of Ahmedabad and the rest in

villages in three talukas: Dhragandhra, Patdi, and Halol. Operations in Dhrangadra and

Patdi were discontinued after the 2004-05 academic year while the organization’s efforts

in Ahmedabad and Halol continue.

A formal evaluation of the effects of the Gyan Shala program has not been done.

However, the children in Gyan Shala schools seem to thrive in the Gyan Shala learning

environment. In March 2003, Gyan Shala students in Ahmedabad were tested by an

independent evaluation team using the same testing instrument that was being used to

asses public school students in the nearby city of Vadodara. Figures 1 and 2 provide a

comparison of the scores of third grade students in Gyan Shala to students in grades 3 and

4 in the Vadodara public schools using the math and language questions respectively.

Gyan Shala students significantly outperformed the public school students in every

subject except copying, even students who were a full grade ahead This, of course, is

insufficient evidence to attribute students’ performances to Gyan Shala’s curricular

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innovations. Without knowledge of students’ counter-factual participation in other

education programs, it is impossible to determine whether or not the children would have

done equally well in other learning environments. The evidence does, however,

demonstrate that the students who attend Gyan Shala’s schools seem to be learning

significantly.

B. Gyan Shala CAL Program

The Gyan Shala Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) program is designed to complement

the students’ in-class experience while allowing the student to work independently. The

goal of the CAL project is to ensure around one hour of daily computer practice to each

child at an annual cost of five dollars per child, exclusive of the cost of power. Two

factors help Gyan Shala achieve this cost target. First, Gyan Shala obtained donations of

old, used desktops (most with Pentium I processors and a few with Pentium II and III

processors) from various sources. Second, the software is designed to facilitate two users

at a time by splitting the screen in half vertically and displaying two sets of worksheets

simultaneously. Because one child uses the keyboard and one the mouse, each child can

work independently of the other.

The computers are organized at a table in the common classroom in groups of

four. Each child is allocated to a particular computer, ensuring that no conflicts arise

among children about who will work on which machine. Since the computers are used in

the slums and interior villages, the project must cope with chronic disruption in electricity

supply. To accommodate these power outages, Gyan Shala also supplied each classroom

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with battery-operated uninterrupted power supplies at each location; this power supply is

capable of sustaining the bank of four computers for about seven hours.

Unlike self-paced programs, the Gyan Shala CAL program is designed to

complement the days’ math curriculum. The software is designed so that children require

no support from the teacher. The role of the teacher is confined to switching on the power

supply and the computers and to allow different batches of eight children to work on the

computers during their allocated time. The schedule of exercises to be presented to the

children is drawn up to match the particular day’s specified learning schedule, although

this matching is only approximate. Two parts of the screen, typically, would present two

different exercises (of twenty to thirty worksheets) to limit children’s ability to copy from

one another. The program supports most of the second and third grade math curriculum.

C. Implementation

The study evaluates the implementation of the CAL program in two different years. The

first year of the study assessed the implementation of the CAL program in 23 schools

located in two localities, Patdi and Dhrangadra, during the 2004-05 academic year. The

second year of the study tracked the implementation of the program in 37 schools located

in Ahmedabad and Halol which, relative to Patdi and Dhrangadra, are more urban

environments.

While the basic program was used in all areas, the program was implemented as

both an in-school and out-of-school program.4 In the first year when project was

implemented in Patdi and Dhrangadhra, the program was run in the latter half of the

4
Gyan Shala planned to implement the same out-of-school program in both years of the study. However,
the local administrators of the program in Patdi and Dhrangadhra decided to implement the program on an
in-school basis instead.

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academic year as an in-school program. Students attended the Gyan Shala schools for the

normal three hour period, but worked on the computer-based worksheets instead of

participating in the structured Gyan Shala classroom curriculum.

During the second year when the program was implemented in Ahmedabad and

Halol, the program was implemented as a year-long out-of-school program. Each

location typically ran two classes in a day, one after the other. The students would arrive

either before or after school depending on the shift of their class. When one class was

going through its normal three hour daily schedule, the children from other class took

turns working on the CAL package. In this way, the program supplemented rather than

replaced the core Gyan Shala curriculum.

III. Research Design

The primary challenge of assessing the causal impact of changes in teaching method on

students’ learning outcomes is the potential selection of schools and students into

treatment by unobservable characteristics correlated with academic performance. To

eliminate this problem, I implemented a random assignment evaluation design in which

individual Gyan Shala schools were randomly assigned either to receive the CAL

program or to use only the standard Gyan Shala curriculum. The random assignment of

the treatment to schools eliminates the possibility that treatment assignment is correlated

with either observable or unobservable school and student characteristics.

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 A. Sample

Table 1 provides a simple tabulation of the schools and students in our sample. The

sample consists of the students attending 60 schools5 in four locations in Gujarat:

Ahmedabad, Halol, Dhrangadhra, and Patdi. For each year of the study, students within

the schools were identified based on the cohort of students who took the Gyan Shala final

exam at the end of the prior academic year. Any student eligible to enter grades two or

three during the year of the study were included within the sample. This included all

students in grade two and all passing students in grade one. To minimize the potential

differences between treatment and control schools, I stratified the random assignment of

schools by the average normalized test score within each year of the study.

During the 2004-05 academic year, the 23 schools in Patdi and Dhrangadhra were

randomly assigned to either a treatment group that received the in-school version of the

intervention for grades two and three or a control group that did not. Students were

identified based on the results of their end-of-year exams in April 2004. The stratified

randomization resulted in a treatment group of 11 schools with 392 students and a control

group of 12 schools with 387 students.

In the second year of the study, 37 additional schools from Ahmedabad and Halol

were added to the study. Students were identified based on their end-of-year exams in

April 2005 of the previous academic year. The schools were randomly assigned either to

a group that would receive the out-of-school intervention for students in grades two and

three during the 2005-06 academic year or a group that would experience only the

5
Sixty-two schools were originally considered for inclusion in the sample. However, two of these schools
(one in the first year and one in the second year) were clear outliers in the distribution of average test scores
by school. Students in both schools scored on average over a half a standard deviation lower than the
school with the most similar score. These schools were randomly assigned separately from the rest of the
sample, and their inclusion in the sample does not change the results presented in Tables 3-9.

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standard Gyan Shala curriculum. As outlined in Table 1, 19 schools containing 682

students were assigned to the treatment group and 18 schools with 695 students were

assigned to the control group.

Overall, the two randomizations resulted in a balanced distribution of schools and

students between the research groups for both years. In the combined sample, thirty

schools were assigned to the treatment group and thirty were assigned to the control

group. This included 1,027 students in the treatment group and 1,082 students in the

control group.

B. Data

Three types of data were available for analysis: students’ math and language scores in

April of the academic year prior to the study (baseline test), students’ math and language

scores in April of the academic year of the study (follow-up test), and basic demographic

information. Baseline assessments of students’ performance and students’ demographic

characteristics allow for a comparison of the research groups to assess their similarity and

to gauge the degree to which I can attribute any subsequent differences in student

performance to the provision of the treatment. Student knowledge of math as measured

in the follow-up test conducted in April of the year of the study then allow for a direct

comparison of the treatment and control groups.

Since the CAL program was designed to enhance the students’ understanding of

the math portion of the Gyan Shala curriculum (which closely follows the official state

curriculum), student performance was measured using the exams administered by Gyan

Shala to its students. These tests were developed to assess students’ knowledge of the

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major math and language subjects taught by Gyan Shala teachers during the year.

Separate exams were administered in grades two and three to allow for differences in

difficulty and variation in the actual subjects covered. The format of the baseline and

follow-up exams also differed though the format for each was the same in each year of

the study. To facilitate comparison between the various versions of the exams, I

normalize the scores on each exam relative to the control group distribution for each year

of the study and grade.

All data was collected by Gyan Shala staff. To ensure the integrity of the exams,

Gyan Shala managerial staff administered the exams directly to children independent of

the teachers. The exams were administered in the individual Gyan Shala classes. The

exams were also administered multiple times in each location in an attempt to catch

absent students.

Finally, I were also able to identify several demographic characteristics of the

children.6 This included students’ gender, religion (Hindu, Muslim, Jain, and Christian),

and if Hindu, the students’ major caste (Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra). Almost

67 percent of the students in the study are Hindu. Twenty percent of the students are

Muslim, and 13 percent of the students are either unclassifiable or practice other religions

present in India. Of the Hindu students, 34 percent are Kshatriya, 22 percent are

Vaishya, and 43 percent are Shudra.

6
This information was unavailable for all children in Gyan Shala’s administrative records. However,
almost all Indian names uniquely identify gender, religion, and for Hindu children, caste.

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 C. Methodology

Because of the random assignment of students to treatment and control groups, the causal

effect of the Gyan Shala CAL program can be estimated directly by comparing the

performance of students in the treatment group to those in the control group using the

follow-up exam. To do this, I employ three statistical models. First, I use a simple

difference estimator that compares the average characteristics of the two groups. Second,

I use a difference estimator that takes into account variation in students’ characteristics

within and between the research groups. Finally, I use a difference in differences

estimator to compare the attrition rates in the two research groups.

The simple difference estimator has two uses. First, I will use it to compare

students using their baseline characteristics to investigate whether any differences exist

between the treatment and control groups based on observable student characteristics.

Second, I also use this estimator to estimate the raw differences between the two groups

on the follow-up test. The estimator takes the following form:

yij = β 0 + β1Treat j + ε ij (1)

Where yij is the outcome variable for child i in school j , ε ij is a random disturbance

term, and Treat j is a dummy variable for a student attending a class assigned to the

treatment group.

Because there are no significant differences between the treatment and control

groups in observable characteristics, the effect of the CAL program can be estimated

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more precisely by taking into account student and school characteristics. This is done

using the following specification:

y ij = β 0 + β 1Treat j + δz ij + ε ij (2)

The variable z ij is a vector of student and school characteristics including the baseline

measure of students’ performance.

Finally, to compare the attrition patterns in each of the research groups, I use a

difference in differences estimator that takes the following form:

y ij = β 0 + β1Treat j + β 2 Attrit i + β 3 Attrit i * Treat j + ε ij (3)

The variable Attrit i is an indicator variable for whether or not a child i takes a follow-up

test in April of the year of the study. The coefficient on the interaction term, β 3 , then

estimates the differences in the relative characteristics of attritors versus non-attritors

between the treatment and control groups.

Each of these statistical models also has to take into account the fact that students

test scores are correlated within schools (Bertrand, Duflo, and Mullainathan, 2003). This

correlation is simply due to the fact that students in a school share many characteristics –

they are taught in the same way, share classmates, and come from the same community.

But the fact that the students’ test scores are not independent of each other means that a

linear estimator that does not take this into account will overestimate the precision of the

treatment effects. The point estimates of the treatment effect will remain unbiased, but

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the estimate of the variance of the point estimate will be biased downwards. If

uncorrected, this downward bias will cause me to reject the null hypothesis too frequently

at a specified significance level.

I account for this issue in two ways. First, I follow the majority of the evaluation

literature and estimate the OLS model while clustering the standard errors at the unit of

randomization (the school) using the Huber-White statistic (Huber, 1967; White 1980,

1982). While this approach has the advantage of being agnostic to the specification of

the within-school correlation, it is too conservative because the estimator does not take

account of the correlation between observations when estimating the coefficients. To

correct for this, I also estimate treatment effects using a nested random effects model

with random effects at the school level and, within schools, at the grade level. I estimate

this model using Generalized Least Squares. In practice, the difference between these

estimators is only relevant for the estimated effects of the out-of-school model in the

second year of the study.

For small sample, it is also necessary to correct for the fact that these methods of

accounting for within group heterogeneity are only asymptotically consistent. Following

Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2008), I use the critical values for determining statistical

significance from a t distribution with G − 2 degrees of freedom where G is the number

of schools included in the regression (see Table 1). In practice, the number of groups is

large enough (especially for the second year results and the results including both years)

that these critical values are still very close to the commonly used critical values from the

asymptotic distribution.7

7
Specifically, I use the following critical values in two-tailed hypothesis tests. For regressions using all
schools (58 degrees of freedom), the critical values are 1.671, 2.000, 2.660 for the ten, five, and one percent

- 16 -
IV. Results

I organize the results as follows. First, I use the observable baseline characteristics to

ensure that the randomization created comparable treatment and control groups. Second,

I analyze the attrition patterns and characteristics of students attriting from the baseline to

make sure that the initially comparable research groups are still comparable at follow-up.

Because of the similarity of the research groups at follow-up, it is then possible to

directly estimate the causal effects of the interventions by directly comparing the

treatment and control groups using equations one and two.

A. Baseline Characteristics

The random assignment of schools either to receive or not to receive the treatment should

create two sets of schools with comparable characteristics. To determine whether or not

this did indeed occur, I compare the schools and students in the treatment and control

group using equation one based on the characteristics of the students available at

baseline. Then, I estimate the distribution of the students’ math and language scores and

compare the entire distribution. All of these estimates suggest that the two groups are, in

fact, directly comparable.

The mean differences between the research groups are presented in Table 2.

Panel A contains the individual students’ test scores. Panel B contains the students’

demographic characteristics, and Panel C contains the school-level characteristics. To

provide a gauge of the magnitude of the estimated differences, the first column contains a

significance levels respectively. For regressions including only the first year (21 degrees of freedom), the
respective critical values are 1.721, 2.080, and 2.831. For regressions only including the second year (35
degrees of freedom), the respective critical values are 1.690, 2.030, 2.724.

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simple correlation between the post-test math scores and the available demographic

characteristics using the entire sample of control students. For each of the indicated

combination of years, the first and second columns contain the average treatment and

control characteristics, and the third column contains the estimated differences.

None of the average differences are large enough to generate significant

differences in the students’ subsequent follow-up math scores. Considering the combined

sample of both years, the differences in the main variable of interest – students’ baseline

math scores – is less than a hundredth of a standard deviation. The differences in the

students’ demographic characteristics are also relatively small. The largest difference is

the 7.8 and 7.1 percentage point differences in the fraction of students from the Vaishya

and Shudra castes respectively, but given the correlation between these characteristics

and students’ math scores, these differences would generate a difference of only 0.006

and 0.014 standard deviations respectively in the follow-up math test.

Finally, I also compare the characteristics of the students’ schools and again, find

no average differences. The control schools are slightly larger, but only have 0.267 more

students on average than the treatment schools. Similarly, the average math performance

of the students in each school is very similar (difference of only 0.013 standard

deviations). And finally, the schools appear to have similar diversity of mathematical

performance – the standard deviation of the students’ test scores differs by less than a

hundredth of a standard deviation.

The final two groups of columns in Table 2 then compare the samples of students

for the individual years of the study. While the magnitudes of the differences are slightly

larger than for the combined samples, none of the differences are statistically significant

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and the magnitudes are still very small. The largest difference is a difference of 0.071

standard deviations in the second year language test scores. The differences in baseline

math scores for each year are both lower than the combined difference of 0.029 standard

deviations.

To check for differences between the groups more generally, Figures 3 and 4

contain kernel density estimates of the students’ math and language scores respectively.

In both cases, the distributions are virtually identical. This and the data from Table 2

suggest that the randomization did indeed create comparable treatment and control

groups.

B. Attrition

While the research groups may be initially similar, students who took the baseline exam

inevitably fail to take the follow-up exam. Some of these students may have dropped out

during the academic year. And some of them may have simply been absent when the

testers to administered the follow-up exam. Either way, it is important to compare the

students that fail to take the follow-up exam to ensure that the same kinds of students

dropped out from each group. If the attrition patterns, on the other hand, were correlated

with the administration of the treatment (e.g. there are large differences in the types of

students that attrite from each group), then the emergent differences in the treatment and

control groups at follow-up would confound the estimate of the causal impact of the

treatment.

Table 3 shows the average characteristics of the attriting students in each research

group. The table is organized in a similar format to Table 2. Panel A contains the raw

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attrition rates for each group. Overall, 25 percent of the control students and 23 percent

of the treatment students failed to take both parts of the follow-up exam, suggesting that

the overall rates of attrition are very similar. Within each year, the difference in attrition

rates was slightly larger at 6 and -7 percent in the first and second years respectively.

However, even these differences are too small to generate significant differences in the

respective samples.

Panel B and C compare the relative attrition patterns in each research group. The

average differences in the first two columns contain estimates of the difference between

attriting and non-attriting students (attriting students less non-attriting students). The

third column then contains the estimated difference between the two estimates, estimated

using equation three.

Looking to compositional differences in Panels B and C, it is clear that not only

are the same number of children attriting, but the same types of students are also attriting.

Poorer performing students are the most likely to drop out of the sample; though on

average, the same kinds of students are dropping out of each of the research groups. The

largest relative difference in test scores is 0.08 standard deviations for the language test

using the entire sample. The differences for the first year are all less than 1.5 hundredths

of a standard deviation.

The differences in other student characteristics show similar patterns. For almost

all of the characteristics the groups experienced the same attrition patterns. Only two of

the estimated differences are statistically significant but again the magnitudes are too

small to generate large differences in the resulting sample: a 13 percent difference in the

- 20 -
relative proportion of Kshatriya students who drop out in the first year and a 14 percent

difference in the relative proportion of second graders who drop out in the second year.

C. One Year Follow-Up, Both Programs

The combined results from the two years of the program suggest that, on average, the

program had little effect on students’ understanding of math. However, the aggregation

masks the significant difference in the performance of the individual forms of the

intervention. The in-school intervention seems to have caused students to learn less math

than they otherwise would have while the out-of-school program seems to have caused

students to learn more. This difference suggests that the computer-based program was a

poor substitute for the Gyan Shala teaching environment, but that the program has value

as a complement to the basic program.

Panel A of Table 4 contains the comparison of the treatment and control groups

using the data from both years of the study. There are three things to note about these

comparisons. First, the average performance in the treatment and control groups on the

one year follow-up exam are very similar – for both language and math. The first column

contains the average value for the control students. The second column contains the

average for the treatment group and the third column contains the estimated difference

between the two groups. All of the differences are two hundredths of a standard

deviation or less.

Second, when the controls are added to the difference equation in column four,

the point estimates on the estimated treatment effects barely change. The largest change

in the estimated effect is 1.1 hundredths of a standard deviation observed for the

- 21 -
difference in language scores. This minimal difference underscores the similarity of the

students who took the post-test in the treatment and control groups.

Third, Figure 5 shows the distribution of students’ test scores on the math section

of the follow-up exam using a kernel density estimator. The results bear out the average

differences. The distributions are very similar and the differences that do exist are no

larger than those observed in the baseline distributions from Figure 3.

D. In-School Program

Breaking the distributions up by method of implementation yields significant differences

in the effects of the two implementations. Panel B of Table 4 contains the results for the

first year of the program when the program was implemented on an in-school basis. The

results in Panel B document that for the in-school version of the program, students who

received the intervention performed worse than students who did not. Overall, students

performed 0.48 standard deviations less on the follow-up test overall and 0.57 standard

deviations less on the math portion of the test. There is some evidence that the treatment

also reduced students’ language scores (a possible indirect effect), but the effects are

sufficiently small that they are not statistically significant.

Figures 6 and 7 estimate the difference in treatment effects for the entire

distribution of students. Figure 6 contains kernel density estimates of the students’

respective performances on the math section of the follow-up exam, similar to those of

Figure 5. The distribution yields a very clear pattern with fewer students in the treatment

group scoring over zero and more students scoring less than zero. Figure 7 contains

estimates from a non-parametric regression of students’ follow-up tests scores on their

- 22 -
baseline scores. This allows for a comparison of post-test scores conditional on students’

baseline performance. The results are very consistent showing that across the

distribution, treated students seem to do equally worse than their untreated peers.

While large, these estimates are consistent with the positive effects measured in

other programs. For example, Banerjee, Cole, Duflo, and Linden (2007) find positive

effects of 0.47 standard deviations from a computer-based math program targeted at

similar students. Given that this program generated these gains by providing only 2

hours of relatively more productive instruction a week (1 hour outside of school and 1

hour in-school), a decline of 0.57 standard deviations is a plausible effect of substituting a

less effective form of instruction for a full third of the school day.

To check the consistency of this result, Table 5 provides the same estimates for

the first year of the program on individual math subjects on the second and third grade

exams. Because the exams covered different subjects, it is necessary to provide the

estimates disaggregated by grade. Results are presented first for grade two and then

grade three. The overall estimates for each grade are provided first with the results

disaggregated by subject below. It is important to keep in mind that because the

estimates have to be made within grade, the sample size in these regressions is much

smaller than for the entire sample (329 second graders and 197 third graders).

Despite the smaller sample size, the results generally bear out the overall

estimates. The overall average treatment effect for both second and third graders is

negative. Younger students seem to fare worse than older students, though the difference

is not statistically significant at conventional levels of significance. The individual

- 23 -
subjects follow the same pattern with all students generally learning less due to the

program, but second grade students learning less than their third grade peers.

Students’ performance in each subject declines significantly with the possible exception

of single digit multiplication.

Table 6 estimates the differences in math scores while dividing the students by

demographic characteristics rather than by subject. For reference, the over all average

difference in math scores is provided in the first row. Panel A contains the estimated

effects by gender. Panel B divides students by religion. And Panel C divides the

students by their performance on the baseline exam. Students are divided into terciles

with the weakest performing students in tercile one.

The results are generally the same as the overall averages and are consistent with

the differences depicted in Figure 7. Across almost every subgroup of students, the

treatment group underperformed the control group. Muslims and students from the

Vaishya caste seemed to fare the best, but given the small number of these students, the

differences are not statistically significant.

E. Out-of-School Program

Unlike the in-school program, the results from the second year of the program suggest

that the added value of the computer assisted learning program in addition to the Gyan

Shala curriculum is positive. The average estimates in Panel C of Table 5 show that the

effects of the program on math are about 0.27 standard deviations – an estimate that is

consistent with those of other programs. However, the statistical significance of this

result depends on the assumptions made about the correlation of students’ scores within a

- 24 -
school and the efficiency of the employed estimator. The difference is not statistically

significant under the clustered standard errors, but it is statistically significant at the five

percent level using the more efficient random effects estimator.8

Figure 8 shows the distribution of students’ follow-up test on the math section of

the exam. Like Figure 6 the distributions show a sharp departure from Figure 5, but

unlike Figure 6, students in the treatment group are more likely to score above zero on

the follow-up exam. Figure 9 contains non-parametric estimates of students’ follow-up

score on their baseline score by research group. Unlike the estimates for the in-school

program, these estimates suggest that the program had a more positive effect for students

at the bottom of the test score distribution than for students who performed better on the

baseline test.

Turning to Table 7, I estimate the effects by subject as in Table 5. These results

suggest that the program had a significant effect for students in grade three and little

effect on students in grade two. Students in grade three benefited by 0.515 standard

deviations overall while students in grade two show an increase of only 0.077 standard

deviations. The difference in the effects is statistically significant at the 10 percent level

(p-value 0.082). Because this program was self administered, it may be that older

students were better able to take advantage of the program. As in Table 5, these results

are consistent across the individual subjects.

8
It is important to note that there are two differences between the random effects estimate and the clustered
standard errors. First, the standard error falls from 0.172 in the clustered estimates to 0.166 in the random
effects estimates as one would expect given the greater efficiency of the estimator. The random effects
estimator, however, is only asymptotically consistent and in what may be a result of small sample bias, the
point estimate is 6.7 hundredths of a standard deviation higher under the random effects estimate.
However, the significance of the random effects point estimate is not solely driven by the change in
magnitude since even the point estimate from the OLS regressions would be statistically significant at the
10 percent level using the standard errors from the random effects estimate.

- 25 -
 Table 8 shows the estimated treatment effects disaggregated by demographic

characteristics. The organization is the same as Table 6. The results are generally

consistent with the non-parametric estimates in Figure 9 – the program has a large

statistically significant effects for poorly performing students. The point estimates show

large positive effects for boys (0.398 standard deviations) and Muslim students (0.688

standard deviations). Both of these subgroups of students had a negative average score

on the baseline math exam. The treatment effect estimates for students in the bottom

tercile of the baseline math distribution confirm this assessment as these students

experience a treatment effect of 0.472 standard deviations that is (like those for boys and

Muslims) statistically significant at the 5 percent level. This effect is 0.35 standard

deviations larger than that of the strongest students (p-value 0.065) and is 0.29 standard

deviations larger than the effect for terciles two and three combined (p-value 0.054).

To check the robustness of this result, I re-estimate the effects of the program on

individual subjects (as in Tables 5 and 7) using only students in the bottom tercile. The

results are presented in Table 9. Unlike the results for all students (Table 7), students in

both grades show a similarly strong response to the treatment with students in the second

grade increasing their score by 0.498 standard deviations and students in the third grades

increasing their score by 0.524 standard deviations. The point estimates for all but one of

the subjects is positive (number ordering is small and negative), and the gains seem to be

reasonably well distributed across subjects.

Overall, these results suggest that the out-of-school model of the program

significantly improved the math performance of older students and the poorest

performing students in the Gyan Shala schools on almost all subjects taught. The effect

- 26 -
for older students may results from the self-administered nature of the program while the

heterogeneity in the treatment effect by ability may reflect the overall structure of the

program. Because the learning model was designed to reinforce the lessons taught by the

teacher rather than to allow students to move forward at their own pace, it seems

reasonable that a student who already understood the material based on the classroom

lectures would gain little from practicing on the computers outside of class. However,

students who did not completely comprehend the material apparently found this

additional instruction to be helpful. This is consistent, for example, with the results of

He, Linden, and MacLeod (2008) who find that stronger performing children benefit

relatively more from a self-paced English language program while weaker students

benefit more from structured games provided by the teachers that reinforce existing

lessons.

V. Cost-Effectiveness

By considering the cost of the overall average change in student test scores, I can

compare the cost-effectiveness of the out-of-school program to other programs that have

been evaluated. At an average effect of 0.27 standard deviations, the projected cost

effectiveness of the intervention is $1.85 dollars per tenth of a standard deviation.

However, because all of the original hardware was donated by companies, this only

includes the cost of repairing the donated computers. To consider the true cost-

effectiveness of the project, I must consider the actual value of the donated computers.

Unfortunately, the age of the computers makes it difficult to estimate both the cost and

expected life of the machines. Since each computer is used by an estimated nine

- 27 -
children, the cost of the program will increase by $3.70 per child or $1.37 per child-tenth

of a standard deviation for every $100 spent on a computer assuming that the computers

depreciate over three years. So, at $100-$200 per computer (which given the age of the

computers is reasonable), the cost per tenth of a standard deviation would increase to

$3.22 to $4.59 per tenth of a standard deviation.

Based on these estimates, the program is on par with other interventions

considered for improving student performance in developing countries. It is more cost

effective than the $7.60 per tenth of a standard deviation math-based computer assisted

learning program evaluated by Bannerjee, Cole, Duflo, and Linden (2007), and it is as

cost effective as a girls scholarship program ($1.77 to $3.53 per child per tenth standard

deviation, Kremer Miguel Thornton 2007), cash incentives for teachers ($3.41 per student

per tenth standard deviation, Glewwe et al. 2003), and textbooks ($4.01, Glewwe et al.

1997). It is, however, less cost-effective than a remedial education program ($1 per tenth

of a standard deviation, Banerjee, Cole, Duflo, and Linden, 2007) and an English teacher

training program ($0.24 per tenth of a standard deviation, Linden, He, MacLeod, 2008).

VI. Conclusion

The effect of the Gyan Shala Computer Assisted Learning Program on students’ math

scores depends on the method in which the program is implemented. Compared to the

apparently productive learning experience students encounter in the normal Gyan Shala

curriculum, the Computer Assisted Learning program is a poor substitute. As a result,

students who experience the program instead of the normal curriculum perform worse

than students who do not receive the treatment. In this model of the program, students

- 28 -
receiving the program performed on average 0.57 standard deviations worse in math than

students who did not receive the program.

The out-of-school model, however, performs differently. The program has an

average effect on all children of 0.28 standard deviations in math. This average reflects

small positive (but statistically insignificant) gains for most students and large positive

gains of 0.47 to 0.68 standard deviations for the poorest performing students and older

students. The difference in the magnitude of the treatment effect for stronger and weaker

students seems to reflect the design of the program which emphasized reinforcement of

material that students had already learned rather than self-paced discovery of subjects not

yet covered in the regular Gyan Shala classes.

More generally, these results emphasize the importance of considering both

relative productivity of learning environments when choosing educational interventions

and the effects those differences will have on different types of students. Decision-

makers must consider not just whether a program works, but rather how well the program

works relative to what students would otherwise experience. And they must consider

whether those differences are appropriate for individual learners. As this evaluation

demonstrates, the format of the program can make the difference between providing

needed assistance to weak students and generally causing all students to learn less than

they would have learned without the intervention.

- 29 -
VI. Bibliography

Angrist, Joshua and Victor Lavy. (2002). “New Evidence on Classroom Computers and

Pupil Learning,” The Economic Journal. 112(482): 735-765.

Anderson, John, C. Franklin Boyle, and Brian J. Reiser. (1985). “Intelligent Tutoring

Systems,” Science. 228(4698): 456-462.

Annual Status of Education Report (ASER). (2007). http://www.pratham.org/aser07/

ASER07.pdf. Accessed: May 19, 2008.

Banerjee, Abhijit, Shawn Cole, Esther Duflo, and Leigh Linden. (2007). “Remedying

Education: Evidence from Two Randomized Experiments in India,” Quarterly

Journal of Economics. 122(3): 1235-1264.

Barrow, Lisa, Lisa Markman, and Cecilia Rouse. (2007). “Technology’s Edge: The

Educational Benefits of Computer-Aided Instruction,” Federal Reserve Bank of

Chicago Working Paper 2007-17.

Bertrand, Marianne, Esther Duflo, and Sendhil Mullainathan. (2004) “How Much Should

We Trust Difference in Differences Estimates?” Quarterly Journal of Economics

119(1): 249-275.

Cameron, A. Colin, Jonah B. Gelbach, and Douglas L. Miller (2007). “Bootstrap-Based

Improvements for Inference with Clustered Errors,” Forthcoming The Review of

Economics and Statistics.

Dynarski, Mark. (2007). “Effectiveness of Reading and Mathematics Software Products:

Findings from the 1st Student Cohort.” Mathematica Report.

http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/redirect_pubsdb.asp?strSite=PDFs

/effectread.pdf. Accessed: May 19, 2008.

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Filmer, Deon, Amer Hasan, and Lant Pritchett. (2006). “A Millennium Learning Goal:

Measuring Real Progress in Education.” Center for Global Development Working

Paper Number 97.

Glewwe, P., Kremer M., Moulin, S. (1997). "Textbooks and Test Scores: Evidence from

a Prospective Evaluation in Kenya," unpublished working paper.

Glewwe, P. Nauman, I., & Kremer M. (2003). "Teacher Incentives," National Bureau of

Economic Research Working Paper # 9671.

Goolsbee, Austan and Jonathan Guryan. (2006). “The Impact of Internet Subsidies on

Public Schools,” Review of Economics and Statistics. 88(2): 336-347.

He, Fang, Leigh Linden, and Margaret MacLeod. (2008). “How to Teach English in

India: Testing the Relative Productivity of Instruction Methods within the Pratham

English Language Education Program.” Working Paper. Columbia University

Department of Economics.

Kirkpatrick, Heather and Larry Cuban. (1998). “Computers Make Smarter Kids –

Right?” Technos Quarterly. 7(2): 1-11.

Kremer, Michael, Edward Miguel, and Rebecca Thornton. (Jan. 2007). "Incentives to

Learn." Harvard University Working Paper.

Leuven, Edwin, Mikael Lindahl, Hessel Oosterbeek, and Dinand Webbink. (2007). “The

Effect of Extra Funding for Disadvantaged Pupils on Achievement,” Review of

Economics and Statistics. 89(4): 721-736.

Machin, Stephen, Sandra McNally, and Olmo Silva. (2006). “New Technology in

Schools: Is There a Payoff?” The Economic Journal. 117(522): 115-167.

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Rouse, Cecilia and Alan Krueger. (2004). “Putting Computerized Instruction to the Test:

A Randomized Evaluation of a “Scientifically Based” Reading Program,” Economics

of Education Review. 23(4): 323-338.

Scholfield, Janet, Rebecca Eurich-Fulcer, and Cheri Britt. (1994). “Teachers, Computer

Tutors, and Teaching: The Artificially Intelligent Tutor as an Agent for Classroom

Change,” American Educational Research Journal. 31(3): 579-607.

Wenglinsky, H. (1998). “Does it compute? The Relationship Between Educational

Technology and Student Achievement in Mathematics.” Princeton, NJ: Educational

Testing Service.

- 32 -
Figure 1: Gyan Shala and Public School Student Performance, Language
Gyan Shala Grade 3
Vadodara Public Grade 3
Vadodara Public Grade 4
98
94

87
82
80
79 78 78
72
66 65

57 59
55 56
53
47 49
46
45 44

35

28
23 22
21
17
15 14
13

Copying Spelling Sentence Read and Antonyms Synonyms Rhyming Reading Writing Complex
Structure Classify Comp Sentence
Structure

Note: Comparison of Gyan Shala third graders and students from the third and forth grade of the Vadodara Municipal
Corporation (MNC) public school system. All scores are percentage of correct answers on the indicated subject.
Figure 2: Gyan Shala and Public School Student Performance, Math

Gyan Shala Grade 3

Vadodara Public Grade 3
Vadodara Public Grade 4
95
94
91
87 86
82
77

69 70
68

61
59
55
51 51
49 47
47
45 44
42 42 42
40
37
34
30 30

20
17

Number Line Expansion Sequences Addition Subtraction Measurement Time Multiplication Division Currency

Note: Comparison of Gyan Shala third graders and students from the third and forth grade of the Vadodara Municipal
Corporation (MNC) public school system. All scores are percentage of correct answers on the indicated subject.

33
Figure 3: Distribution of Normalized Math Scores at Baseline

Note: Kernal density estimate of the distribution of baseline math scores for the indicated research group using
observations from both years of the study. Bandwidth set to 0.3 standard deviations.
Figure 4: Distribution of Normalized Language Scores at Baseline

Note: Kernal density estimate of the distribution of baseline language scores for the indicated research group using
observations from both years of the study. Bandwidth set to 0.3 standard deviations.

34
Figure 5: Distribution of Normalized Math Scores at Follow-Up

Note: Kernal density estimate of the distribution of follow-up math scores for the indicated research group using
observations from both years of the study. Bandwidth set to 0.3 standard deviations.
Figure 6: Distribution of Normalized Math Scores at Follow-Up, In-School

Note: Kernal density estimate of the distribution of follow-up math scores for the indicated research group using
observations from the first year of the study. Bandwidth set to 0.3 standard deviations.

35
Figure 7: Follow-Up Math Scores by Baseline Math Scores, In-School

Note: Local linear polynomial estimates of the relationship between the normalized math follow-up scores and
normalized baseline scores for the first year of the study. Bandwidth set to 0.5 standard deviations.
Figure 8: Distribution of Normalized Math Scores at Follow-Up, Out-of-School

Note: Kernal density estimate of the distribution of follow-up math scores for the indicated research group using
observations from the first year of the study. Bandwidth set to 0.3 standard deviations.

36
Figure 9: Follow-Up Math Scores by Baseline Math Scores, Out-of-School

Note: Local linear polynomial estimates of the relationship between the normalized math follow-up scores and
normalized baseline scores for the second year of the study. Bandwidth set to 0.5 standard deviations.

37
Table 1: Distribution of the Sample by Research Group

Unit of Analisys Treatment Control Total

Schools in In-School Program Experiment (Year 1) 11 12 23

Schools in Out-of-School Program Experiment (Year 2) 19 18 37
Total Villages 30 30 60

Children in In-School Program Experiment (Year 1) 392 387 779

Children in Out-of-School Program Experiment (Year 2) 682 695 1377
Total Children 1074 1082 2156
Note: This table contains a tabulation of the schools and students in the sample by program and by research group.
Table 2: Comparison of Pre-Existing Characteristics
Correlation Both Years In-School Program (Year 1) Out-of-School Program (Year 2)
with Control Treatment Control Treatment Control Treatment
Characteristic Math Score Average Average Difference Average Average Difference Average Average Difference
Panel A: Baseline Test Scores
Total Score 0.031 0.011 -0.02 0 0.033 0.033 0.048 -0.001 -0.049
(0.030) (0.031) (0.086) (0.051) (0.051) (0.148) (0.037) (0.039) (0.106)
Math Score 0.276*** 0.028 0.026 -0.002 0 0.018 0.018 0.044 0.031 -0.013
(0.044) (0.030) (0.030) (0.082) (0.051) (0.049) (0.157) (0.037) (0.038) (0.094)
Language Score 0.235*** 0.032 0.002 -0.029 0 0.045 0.045 0.049 -0.022 -0.071
(0.050) (0.030) (0.030) (0.088) (0.051) (0.052) (0.133) (0.037) (0.038) (0.115)
Panel B: Student Characteristics
Female 0.049 0.415 0.425 0.01 0.372 0.388 0.01 0.439 0.446 0.01
(0.046) (0.015) (0.015) (0.025) (0.025) (0.025) (0.025) (0.019) (0.019) (0.025)
Second Grade -0.226** 0.589 0.594 0.005 0.625 0.561 0.005 0.568 0.613 0.005
(0.090) (0.015) (0.015) (0.053) (0.025) (0.025) (0.053) (0.019) (0.019) (0.053)
Muslim 0.213 0.201 0.216 0.015 0.121 0.013 0.015 0.246 0.333 0.015
(0.216) (0.012) (0.013) (0.092) (0.017) (0.006) (0.092) (0.016) (0.018) (0.092)
Kshatriya Caste -0.088 0.233 0.174 -0.059 0.243 0.117 -0.059 0.227 0.207 -0.059
(0.128) (0.013) (0.012) (0.056) (0.022) (0.016) (0.056) (0.016) (0.016) (0.056)
Vaishya Caste -0.077 0.153 0.232 0.078 0.134 0.263 0.078 0.164 0.214 0.078
(0.125) (0.011) (0.013) (0.067) (0.017) (0.022) (0.067) (0.014) (0.016) (0.067)
Shudra Caste -0.199 0.287 0.216 -0.071 0.395 0.344 -0.071 0.227 0.142 -0.071
(0.134) (0.014) (0.013) (0.055) (0.025) (0.024) (0.055) (0.016) (0.013) (0.055)
Panel C: School Characteristics
School Size 0.006 36.067 35.8 -0.267 32.25 35.636 3.386 38.611 35.895 -2.716
(0.008) (2.343) (2.166) (3.191) (3.382) (3.034) (4.544) (3.118) (2.996) (4.324)
Average Math Score 0.383 0.065 0.052 -0.013 0.041 0.015 -0.026 0.082 0.074 -0.008
(0.331) (0.063) (0.060) (0.087) (0.120) (0.107) (0.161) (0.071) (0.073) (0.102)
Math Standard Deviation 0.06 0.909 0.912 0.003 0.882 0.912 0.03 0.927 0.912 -0.015
(0.466) (0.039) (0.037) (0.054) (0.073) (0.046) (0.086) (0.046) (0.053) (0.070)
Note: This table estimates differences between the treatment and control schools using pre-existing student and school characteristics. The first column contains a regression of post-test math scores on the indicated
variables for the control group using both years of data. Sample size for the respective years is provided in Table 1. All standard errors are clustered at the school level, and * indicates significance at the 10 percent
level, ** at the 5 percent level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values have been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom equal to two
less than the number of schools included in the regression.
Table 3: Comparison of Attriting Students
Both Years In-School Program (Year 1) Out-of-School Program (Year 2)
Control Treatment Difference- Control Treatment Difference- Control Treatment Difference-
Characteristic Difference Difference Difference Difference Difference Difference Difference Difference Difference
Panel A: Attrition Rates
Attrited from Sample 0.25 0.229 -0.02 0.295 0.355 0.06 0.224 0.157 -0.068
(0.043) (0.064) (0.045)
Panel B: Baseline Test Scores
Total Score -0.585*** -0.513*** 0.071 -0.590*** -0.578*** 0.012 -0.580*** -0.523*** 0.057
(0.108) (0.088) (0.138) (0.194) (0.111) (0.219) (0.127) (0.186) (0.222)
Math Score -0.528*** -0.481*** 0.047 -0.559** -0.549*** 0.01 -0.506*** -0.458** 0.048
(0.112) (0.090) (0.142) (0.207) (0.122) (0.235) (0.126) (0.185) (0.221)
Language Score -0.545*** -0.463*** 0.081 -0.487** -0.497*** -0.01 -0.581*** -0.516*** 0.065
(0.099) (0.083) (0.128) (0.173) (0.088) (0.190) (0.122) (0.169) (0.206)
Panel C: Student Characteristics
Female 0.074* 0.066** -0.008 0.119** 0.079** -0.04 0.054 0.092* 0.038
(0.037) (0.033) (0.049) (0.047) (0.033) (0.056) (0.053) (0.049) (0.071)
Second Grade 0.064 -0.017 -0.081 -0.14 -0.056 0.085 0.193*** 0.049 -0.144*
(0.073) (0.075) (0.104) (0.133) (0.128) (0.181) (0.045) (0.072) (0.084)
Muslim -0.046 -0.154** -0.107 -0.035 -0.009 0.027 -0.036 -0.140* -0.104
(0.044) (0.060) (0.074) (0.075) (0.012) (0.075) (0.065) (0.076) (0.098)
Kshatriya Caste -0.059 0.011 0.07 -0.071 0.063 0.134* -0.053 0.01 0.063
(0.040) (0.040) (0.056) (0.067) (0.042) (0.078) (0.046) (0.054) (0.070)
Vaishya Caste 0.037 0.042 0.005 0.008 0.016 0.008 0.061 0.045 -0.016
(0.049) (0.050) (0.070) (0.048) (0.050) (0.068) (0.073) (0.058) (0.091)
Shudra Caste 0.041 0.041 0 0.036 -0.065 -0.102 0.021 0.042 0.021
(0.043) (0.032) (0.053) (0.069) (0.050) (0.083) (0.051) (0.028) (0.058)
Note: This table contains estimates of the characteristics of students not surveyed in the follow-up test. Panel A contains the percentage of students not covered in each of the respective research
groups. Estimates for the Treatment and Control Difference in Panels B and C contain the average difference in characteristics of attriting students relative to staying students. The third column then
contains the difference in the relative characteristics between treatment and control group. All standard errors are clustered at the school level, and * indicates significance at the 10 percent level, **
at the 5 percent level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values have been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom
equal to two less than the number of schools included in the regression.
Table 4: Follow-up Test Scores

Control Treatment Difference Difference Difference

Characteristic Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls Rand Effects
Panel A: Both Years
Total Score 0.005 -0.014 -0.015 -0.02 -0.054
(0.035) (0.039) (0.154) (0.171) (0.148)
Math Score -0.001 -0.019 -0.019 -0.018 -0.06
(0.035) (0.038) (0.152) (0.167) (0.154)
Language Score 0.02 0.002 -0.007 -0.018 -0.035
(0.035) (0.038) (0.144) (0.163) (0.134)
Panel B: In-School Program (Year 1)
Total Score 0 -0.47 -0.47 -0.481* -0.556**
(0.060) (0.076) (0.340) (0.245) (0.247)
Math Score 0.006 -0.555 -0.561 -0.566** -0.656**
(0.059) (0.075) (0.328) (0.253) (0.264)
Language Score 0.012 -0.266 -0.278 -0.276 -0.322
(0.059) (0.074) (0.308) (0.219) (0.222)
Panel C: Out-of-School Program (Year 2)
Total Score 0.008 0.187 0.178 0.254 0.290*
(0.044) (0.042) (0.181) (0.174) (0.161)
Math Score -0.005 0.217 0.222 0.28 0.332**
(0.044) (0.040) (0.169) (0.172) (0.162)
Language Score 0.024 0.12 0.097 0.178 0.188
(0.043) (0.043) (0.188) (0.166) (0.157)
Note: Dependent variable is the score in the respective subject on the follow-up exam. The total sample for the estimates is 1,640
students (526 students in the In-School Program in Year 1 and 1,114 in the Out-of-School Program in Year 2). All standard errors
are clustered at the school level unless otherwise indicated, and * indicates significance at the 10 percent level, ** at the 5 percent
level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values have been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a
small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom equal to two less than the number of schools included in the regression.
Table 5: Specific Math Subjects, In-School Program (Year 1)

Grade 2 Grade 3
Treatment Control Difference Difference Treatment Control Difference Difference
Grade 2 Subject Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls Grade 3 Subject Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls

Total Score 0.04 -0.66 -0.699* -0.741** Total Score -0.062 -0.41 -0.348 -0.333
(0.071) (0.100) (0.400) (0.305) (0.106) (0.113) (0.346) (0.311)

Counting 0.019 -0.535 -0.555 -0.608** Counting -0.047 -0.191 -0.144 -0.197
(0.073) (0.087) (0.331) (0.249) (0.108) (0.109) (0.281) (0.291)
Larger/Smaller Numbers 0.021 -0.26 -0.282 -0.298 Place Values -0.022 0.127 0.148 0.194
(0.073) (0.088) (0.257) (0.178) (0.103) (0.131) (0.177) (0.150)
Greater Than/Less Than 0.022 -0.362 -0.384 -0.431* Addition -0.004 0.058 0.062 0.09
(0.073) (0.083) (0.329) (0.233) (0.107) (0.094) (0.206) (0.219)
Sequences 0.027 -0.513 -0.540* -0.697*** Subtraction -0.037 -0.134 -0.097 -0.109
(0.072) (0.092) (0.271) (0.217) (0.107) (0.120) (0.254) (0.281)
Number Order 0.015 -0.332 -0.347 -0.409* Multiplication -0.006 -0.086 -0.08 -0.051
(0.074) (0.093) (0.274) (0.236) (0.106) (0.105) (0.193) (0.187)
Addition 0.042 -0.443 -0.485 -0.494 Division 0.008 -0.109 -0.117 -0.074
(0.069) (0.102) (0.289) (0.296) (0.105) (0.103) (0.198) (0.212)
Subtraction 0.032 -0.633 -0.666* -0.708** Sequences -0.024 -0.39 -0.366 -0.434*
(0.071) (0.102) (0.320) (0.299) (0.107) (0.093) (0.222) (0.214)
Multiplication 0.021 -0.328 -0.35 -0.347 Word -0.066 -0.4 -0.333 -0.349
(0.073) (0.096) (0.282) (0.213) (0.104) (0.114) (0.365) (0.346)
Measure 0.043 -0.676 -0.719*** -0.680*** Fractions -0.016 -0.262 -0.246 -0.303
(0.073) (0.070) (0.252) (0.222) (0.108) (0.085) (0.333) (0.273)
Word Problems 0.039 -0.407 -0.447 -0.449* Reading Tables/Graphs -0.02 -0.685 -0.665** -0.579*
(0.073) (0.084) (0.314) (0.259) (0.107) (0.090) (0.310) (0.280)
Note: Dependent variable is the score in the respective subject on the follow-up math exam. Estimates are for the in-school version of the program conducted in the first year. The sample contains 329 second grade
students and 197 third grade students. All standard errors are clustered at the school level, and * indicates significance at the 10 percent level, ** at the 5 percent level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values have
been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom equal to two less than the number of schools included in the regression.
Table 6: Treatment Effects by Sub-Sample, In-School Program (Year 1)

Sample Control Treatment Difference Difference

Sub-Sample Size Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls
All Students 526 0.006 -0.555 -0.561 -0.561**
(0.059) (0.075) (0.328) (0.247)
A. Gender
Female 183 -0.006 -0.663 -0.657* -0.613**
(0.102) (0.128) (0.359) (0.284)
Male 324 0.041 -0.491 -0.532 -0.559**
(0.072) (0.094) (0.319) (0.243)
B. Religion
Hindu 482 -0.033 -0.576 -0.542 -0.589**
(0.064) (0.076) (0.331) (0.247)
Kshatriya Caste 96 0.146 -0.688 -0.834** -0.828***
(0.104) (0.185) (0.325) (0.263)
Vaishya Caste 101 0.006 -0.679 -0.685 -0.279
(0.139) (0.151) (0.413) (0.256)
Shudra Caste 198 -0.199 -0.577 -0.379 -0.632
(0.103) (0.136) (0.461) (0.383)
Muslim 40 0.277 0.189 -0.088 -0.039
(0.158) (0.438) (0.393) (0.396)
C. Baseline Distribution
First Tercile 129 -0.661 -1.398 -0.737 -0.847**
(0.136) (0.153) (0.449) (0.368)
Second Tercile 181 -0.018 -0.644 -0.626** -0.622**
(0.087) (0.100) (0.243) (0.246)
Third Tercile 216 0.419 0.029 -0.39 -0.426
(0.072) (0.102) (0.254) (0.254)
Note: Dependent variable is the score on the follow-up math exam. Estimates are for the in-school version of the program
conducted in the first year, using only the indicated subsample of students. All standard errors are clustered at the school level,
and * indicates significance at the 10 percent level, ** at the 5 percent level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values have
been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom equal
to two less than the number of schools included in the regression.
Table 7: Specific Math Subjects, Out-of-School Program (Year 2)

Grade 2 Grade 3
Treatment Control Difference Difference Treatment Control Difference Difference
Grade 2 Subject Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls Grade 3 Subject Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls

Total Score -0.001 0.115 0.116 0.077 Total Score 0 0.385 0.385* 0.515**
(0.061) (0.053) (0.175) (0.181) (0.063) (0.059) (0.224) (0.216)

Counting 0.026 0.154 0.128 0.028 Counting -0.002 0.356 0.358* 0.439**
(0.061) (0.061) (0.209) (0.222) (0.063) (0.061) (0.178) (0.172)
Larger/Smaller Numbers 0.002 -0.1 -0.102 -0.14 Place Values 0.003 0.2 0.197 0.272
(0.059) (0.047) (0.117) (0.121) (0.063) (0.059) (0.176) (0.166)
Greater Than/Less Than 0.072 0.05 -0.022 -0.052 Addition -0.006 0.19 0.196 0.213
(0.060) (0.054) (0.160) (0.162) (0.063) (0.051) (0.179) (0.160)
Sequences -0.023 -0.061 -0.038 -0.011 Subtraction 0.004 0.359 0.355** 0.400**
(0.061) (0.053) (0.118) (0.135) (0.063) (0.054) (0.172) (0.156)
Number Order -0.043 -0.023 0.02 -0.033 Multiplication 0.003 0.03 0.026 0.105
(0.060) (0.056) (0.116) (0.125) (0.062) (0.066) (0.179) (0.151)
Addition -0.053 0.083 0.136 0.13 Division -0.005 0.303 0.309* 0.370**
(0.061) (0.048) (0.125) (0.133) (0.063) (0.065) (0.166) (0.153)
Subtraction -0.003 0.014 0.017 -0.004 Sequences 0.003 0.197 0.194 0.285
(0.061) (0.049) (0.144) (0.144) (0.063) (0.069) (0.231) (0.232)
Multiplication -0.045 0.031 0.076 0.121 Word 0 0.444 0.444** 0.580***
(0.060) (0.053) (0.109) (0.099) (0.063) (0.068) (0.213) (0.203)
Measure 0.05 0.081 0.031 0.019 Fractions 0.007 0.322 0.315 0.422
(0.060) (0.052) (0.163) (0.150) (0.063) (0.073) (0.277) (0.261)
Word Problems 0.001 0.244 0.243 0.202 Reading Tables/Graphs 0.005 0.183 0.178 0.281
(0.062) (0.056) (0.189) (0.175) (0.063) (0.062) (0.204) (0.197)
Note: Dependent variable is the score in the respective subject on the follow-up math exam. Estimates are for the out-of-school version of the program conducted in the second year. The sample contains 631 second
grade students and 483 third grade students. All standard errors are clustered at the school level, and * indicates significance at the 10 percent level, ** at the 5 percent level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values
have been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom equal to two less than the number of schools included in the regression.
Table 8: Treatment Effects by Sub-Sample, Out-of-School Program (Year 2)

Sample Control Treatment Difference Difference

Sub-Sample Size Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls
All Students 1114 -0.005 0.217 0.222 0.258
(0.044) (0.040) (0.169) (0.175)
A. Gender
Female 478 0.08 0.197 0.117 0.089
(0.062) (0.062) (0.158) (0.165)
Male 634 -0.068 0.234 0.302 0.398**
(0.061) (0.053) (0.187) (0.178)
B. Religion
Hindu 770 0.09 0.063 -0.027 0.071
(0.048) (0.051) (0.145) (0.152)
Kshatriya Caste 247 0.09 -0.139 -0.229 -0.101
(0.084) (0.101) (0.220) (0.229)
Vaishya Caste 200 0.123 0.163 0.039 0.186
(0.105) (0.073) (0.130) (0.135)
Shudra Caste 198 0.049 0.136 0.087 0.102
(0.094) (0.122) (0.227) (0.222)
Muslim 341 -0.3 0.498 0.797** 0.688*
(0.099) (0.061) (0.347) (0.350)
C. Baseline Distribution
First Tercile 320 -0.514 -0.116 0.398** 0.472**
(0.087) (0.068) (0.192) (0.194)
Second Tercile 373 -0.102 0.105 0.207 0.223
(0.067) (0.074) (0.207) (0.197)
Third Tercile 421 0.434 0.59 0.156 0.122
(0.063) (0.058) (0.190) (0.193)
Note: Dependent variable is the score on the follow-up math exam. Estimates are for the out-of-school version of the program
conducted in the second year, using only the indicated subsample of students. All standard errors are clustered at the school level,
and * indicates significance at the 10 percent level, ** at the 5 percent level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values have
been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom equal
to two less than the number of schools included in the regression.
Table 9: Specific Math Subjects Year 2, Lowest Performing Students

Grade 2 Grade 3
Treatment Control Difference Difference Treatment Control Difference Difference
Grade 2 Subject Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls Grade 3 Subject Average Average w/o Controls w/ Controls

Total Score -0.727 -0.208 0.518*** 0.498** Total Score -0.362 -0.014 0.348 0.524**
(0.149) (0.093) (0.179) (0.193) (0.101) (0.098) (0.273) (0.258)

Counting -0.298 0.049 0.347 0.331 Counting -0.29 0.147 0.438* 0.645***
(0.147) (0.117) (0.219) (0.223) (0.105) (0.104) (0.234) (0.216)
Larger/Smaller Numbers -0.341 -0.257 0.084 0.109 Place Values -0.386 -0.201 0.185 0.324
(0.141) (0.098) (0.213) (0.219) (0.110) (0.093) (0.247) (0.239)
Greater Than/Less Than -0.483 -0.313 0.171 0.188 Addition -0.178 0.062 0.24 0.285
(0.148) (0.101) (0.179) (0.187) (0.120) (0.099) (0.239) (0.220)
Sequences -0.66 -0.359 0.301 0.248 Subtraction -0.268 0.117 0.384* 0.463**
(0.180) (0.111) (0.184) (0.190) (0.111) (0.099) (0.201) (0.198)
Number Order -0.367 -0.357 0.01 -0.017 Multiplication -0.21 -0.307 -0.097 0.109
(0.134) (0.109) (0.213) (0.194) (0.123) (0.124) (0.217) (0.179)
Addition -0.68 -0.101 0.580*** 0.584*** Division -0.151 0.078 0.228 0.367
(0.150) (0.093) (0.199) (0.177) (0.108) (0.106) (0.266) (0.228)
Subtraction -0.658 -0.155 0.503** 0.432** Sequences -0.176 0.036 0.212 0.307
(0.150) (0.087) (0.186) (0.204) (0.114) (0.121) (0.292) (0.299)
Multiplication -0.769 -0.131 0.638*** 0.707*** Word -0.181 0.197 0.378 0.514**
(0.129) (0.111) (0.179) (0.197) (0.094) (0.108) (0.247) (0.250)
Measure -0.453 -0.102 0.351** 0.335** Fractions -0.251 0.137 0.388 0.528*
(0.103) (0.099) (0.158) (0.154) (0.101) (0.120) (0.305) (0.266)
Word Problems -0.475 0.023 0.499** 0.470** Reading Tables/Graphs -0.281 -0.181 0.1 0.202
(0.127) (0.109) (0.217) (0.230) (0.113) (0.096) (0.277) (0.248)
Note: Dependent variable is the score in the respective subject on the follow-up math exam. Estimates are for the out-of-school version of the program conducted in the second year using only students in the bottom
tercile of the baseline test score distribution. The sample contains 146 second grade students and 174 third grade students. All standard errors are clustered at the school level, and * indicates significance at the 10
percent level, ** at the 5 percent level, and *** at the 1 percent level. Critical values have been determined following Cameron, Gelbach, and Miller (2007), using a small sample t distribution with degrees of freedom equal
to two less than the number of schools included in the regression.