Classroom Composition and Student Academic Achievement: The Impact of Peers’ Parental Education

Abstract

Abstract Using data from a nationally representative survey of middle school students in China and exploiting the random assignment of students to classrooms within schools, the study investigates the causal effect of peers’ parental education on students’ scholastic performance. The results show that the education level of peers’ parents improves students’ academic achievement. Students with high-educated parents benefit more from classmates with higher parental education compared to students with low-educated parents. The investigation of mechanisms reveals that the peer effects could be in part explained by peers’ academic quality, classroom atmosphere, and behaviors of students’ friends. However, peers’ parental education has no impact on teachers’ pedagogical methods and teaching efforts. The paper also shows that failing to account for the nonrandom assignment of students within schools causes an upward bias in the estimated peer effects of parental education.