School inputs and student performance in public elementary schools in Palawan: a quantile regression analysis

Abstract

This study investigates the role of school resources in different measures of student performance in public elementary schools in the province of Palawan. We contend that it is not enough to identify which school resources matter the most, but that it would be more informative for policy purposes to identify which student types may benefit the most from the provision of a given school resource. This way, we may be able to target our allocations toward more productive educational investments. Using quantile regression analysis, we find that in the case of Palawan, improvements in pupil-teacher and pupil-toilet ratios may benefit high-performing schools the most. We also find that class size and pupil-room ratio improvements, along with the provision of guidance counselors and science laboratories, may benefit low-performing schools the most. Our results also give some evidence that conventional ordinary least squares (OLS) procedures may be both insufficient and imprecise in estimating education production functions, and that educational policies based on least squares methods alone may be misguided if not accompanied by other techniques, such as quantile regression, which can offer more valuable insights into education production processes in general.

JEL classification: I21, I28, C19