Eric Bettinger

English

Research Papers in Economics

 
 
Lessons from Private-School Vouchers  
in Colombia 
1 
 
Eric Bettinger 
E 
 
ducation vouchers are one of the most politi-
cally divisive issues in the United States. De-
bates over the constitutionality and potential 
effectiveness of vouchers have taken place at all lev-
els and branches of government. In the United States, 
the underlying argument in favor of vouchers centers 
on the effectiveness of public education, particularly 
in poor, urban areas. Voucher proponents claim that 
poor, urban schools are failing, that private schools 
may provide a better education to their students, and 
that vouchers will increase competition between 
schools and subsequently raise performance in all 
schools. On the other hand, critics argue that vouch-
ers can lead to additional funding problems in urban 
school districts and may siphon the best students 
away from public schools.   
 
In contrast to the debates in the United States, 
discussions about vouchers in developing countries 
center on the supply of and access to primary and 
secondary education. In developing countries, private 
schools make up a much larger share of educational 
providers than in the United States. Additionally, the 
public infrastructure is often unable to meet the 
demand for public schools. Such was the case in 
Colombia in 1991.   
 
In the early 1990s, secondary-school enrollment rates 
were extremely low for the poorest children in Co-
lombia. Only 55 percent of eligible students actually 
attended secondary school. The gap in enrollment 
rates between the poorest and richest students in Co-
lombia was almost 35 percent (Sanchez and Mendes 
1995). At the same time, Colombia’s public school 
system was at its capacity. The school day was only 
four hours long, and 98 percent of public schools 
hosted multiple sessions per day; 20 percent of 
schools hosted three sessions per day in the same 
building. Forecasts from the World Bank (1993) 
suggested that Colombia’s public schools were not 
prepared to handle the increase in enrollment that 
would occur over the next decade. 
 
The voucher debate in Colombia was not about com-
petition; it was about how to increase the capacity of 
the country to promote and manage additional enroll-
ment. The central idea was to exploit excess capacity 
in private schools by allowing education vouchers for 
students enrolled in public schools. The resulting 
shift of students from public to private schools could 
create additional spaces in the public sector and po-
tentially lead to an expansion of overall enrollment. 
 
The program, entitled the Plan de Ampliación de Co-
bertura de la Educación Secundaria (PACES), began 
in 1991 and offered vouchers to students entering 
sixth grade, the start of Colombian secondary school. 
The vouchers were only available to the poorest of 
Colombia’s population; applicants had to present 
evidence that they lived in a poor neighborhood.   
 
Students were only eligible if they had been attending 
a public primary school, and they had to be accepted 
at a private school prior to their application. Elite pri-
vate schools did not participate in the program, but 
studies have shown that the private schools that   
accepted the vouchers had similar pupil–teacher ra-
tios, test scores, and access to technology (King, 
Rawlings, Gutierrez, Pardo, and Torres 1997). If stu-
dents were selected to receive a voucher, they could 
renew it each year through graduation as long as they 
did not repeat a grade.   
 
By 1997, PACES was one of the world’s largest 
private-school voucher programs; over 125,000 
vouchers had been awarded. While PACES was large 
relative to other voucher programs, it was small 
relative to Columbia’s overall secondary school 
system. In 1995, approximately 3.1 million students 
  
 
                       Eric Bettinger 
attended secondary schools in Colombia, with 
roughly 37 percent of students in private schools.   
 
From the beginning, the demand for PACES vouch-
ers far exceeded the supply. As a fair way to allocate 
vouchers when there was excess demand, the use of 
lotteries—one of the distinctive elements of 
PACES—was implemented. These lotteries created a 
laboratory with which to evaluate the effectiveness of 
the vouchers. Similar to a randomized trial in medi-
cine, the voucher lottery created “control” and 
“treatment” groups. Students who applied to the 
voucher lottery and did not win formed an unbiased 
comparison group for students who did win, and 
comparing the academic and non-academic outcomes 
of students involved in the voucher lottery shows the 
effects of the voucher program. 
 
There have been two major studies utilizing these 
voucher lotteries to measure the effects of PACES.   
The first study was conducted by Josh Angrist, Erik 
Bloom, Elizabeth King, Michael Kremer, and me   
(Angrist et al. 2002). Using survey data, we examined 
the effects the use of vouchers had after three years on 
students who had applied for the vouchers in Bogotá in 
1995. As a longer-run follow-up to the first study, Josh 
Angrist, Michael Kremer, and I focused on high 
school graduation and college-entrance-exam data for 
these same students (Angrist et al. forthcoming). In the 
remainder of this paper, I review the evidence from 
these studies and discuss some of the lessons that the 
Colombia voucher program sheds on education in both 
developed and developing countries.   
 
EFFECTS AFTER THREE YEARS 
 
For the first study, conducted in 1998 and 1999, we 
surveyed almost 3,000 students who had applied for 
PACES vouchers in selected cities throughout Co-
lombia. Our survey included questions examining 
students’ education histories, their siblings’ subse-
quent education experiences, and students’ non-
academic outcomes. Because of the randomness of 
the voucher, we only need to compare the average 
outcomes of voucher winners and voucher losers to 
learn about the impact of the program. 
 
One of the most obvious outcomes of the program was 
its effect on private-school attendance.  Because stu-
dents had to be accepted at a private school prior to the 
voucher lottery, most applicants had a preference for 
private schooling. Among students who won the 
voucher, 96 percent attended private school that year; 
among students who applied for and did not win the 
voucher, 90 percent attended private school the next 
year regardless. While lottery winners stayed in private 
schools, applicants who did not win began leaving pri-
vate schools in grades seven and eight. By the time of 
our survey (eighth grade), only 54 percent of voucher 
lottery losers were in private schools, compared to 70 
percent of lottery winners.    
 
One of the program’s interesting effects on atten-
dance patterns occurred among students who had 
applied to vocational private schools prior to the 
voucher lottery. These students who did not win a 
voucher behaved quite differently than students who 
did. Voucher lottery winners attended the vocational 
schools to which they had applied; lottery losers, by 
contrast, transferred to academic schools. If one 
measures school quality by the educational outcomes 
of its students, vocational-voucher lottery losers at-
tended  better schools than the vocational-voucher 
lottery winners. 
 
We generally found that lottery winners had better 
educational outcomes than lottery losers. Although 
lottery winners only completed about one-tenth of a 
year more of school than lottery losers and were just as 
likely to drop out, one big difference did stand out: 
repetition rates. About one in five lottery losers had to 
repeat grades six or seven. Among voucher winners, 
only one in seven students repeated. The difference 
translates to a 25 percent reduction in repetition rates. 
In terms of test scores, voucher winners scored about 
one grade-level higher on standardized exams than 
voucher losers. 
 
Another striking finding involved the program’s effects 
on non-academic outcomes. Colombia, like many de-
veloping countries, has a substantial number of youths 
working outside the home. Voucher lottery winners 
were less likely to be working outside the home and 
worked fewer hours on average than lottery losers. 
Given that there was virtually no difference in drop-out 
rates between these groups of students, this suggests 
that vouchers alleviated working commitments of 
voucher winners, potentially freeing up time that they 
could devote to their studies. Additionally, we tracked 
whether students were married or cohabitating with a 
significant other at the time of our survey (approxi-
mately age 15): Lottery winners were less likely than 
lottery losers to be involved in such a relationship.  
 
Lessons from Private-School Vouchers in Columbia                    
And what of the voucher winners who attended voca-
tional schools? They had less grade repetition, com-
pleted more years of schooling, and worked fewer 
hours outside the home than students who applied for 
the vocational voucher and did not win. Given that 
these voucher-winning students attended schools that 
appeared inferior academically, this finding may have 
some interesting implications for how the voucher 
program affected students. 
 
LONG-RUN EDUCATIONAL EFFECTS 
 
In Colombia, 90 percent of graduating seniors take 
the college entrance exam. With the cooperation of 
the national testing office (ICFES), we were able to 
match applicants’ records to their subsequent exams. 
As before, we only needed to compare the average 
outcome for lottery winners and losers to identify the 
effects of the vouchers.   
 
Of the students who initially applied for the voucher, 
almost one-third eventually took the college entrance 
exam. Lottery winners were about 5 to 7 percentage 
points more likely than lottery losers to take the exam. 
The voucher hence increased their likelihood of taking 
the college entrance exam by about 20 percent.  
 
Angrist et al. (forthcoming) also describe the effects of 
the voucher program on college-entrance-exam scores. 
(Differences in exam scores are harder to interpret be-
cause the voucher program induced many students to 
take the exam who would not have otherwise done so.) 
When we compare the raw scores, we find that lottery 
winners have higher language scores than lottery los-
ers. Moreover, using a variety of econometric methods, 
we attempt to identify the effects the voucher program 
has on test scores of both average and high-achieving 
students who applied to the voucher lottery. We find 
that the program improves test scores at the mean as 
well as for the highest achievers (i.e., students over the 
90
th percentile).   
 
Again, when we look at applicants who applied to voca-
tional schools, we see that lottery winners had higher 
test scores and a greater likelihood of taking the college 
entrance exam than lottery losers. This is interesting, 
given that vocational-voucher winners were more likely 
than vocational-voucher losers to attend vocational 
schools, whose records for getting students to take the 
ICFES and whose students’ subsequent performances 
on the exam are inferior to those of academic schools. 
Voucher winners at vocational schools did well despite 
their less-academic surroundings. 
 
D
 
ISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION 
The voucher program in Colombia proved to be very 
successful for students who were able to participate. 
Not only did their academic outcomes improve, but 
so did many of their non-academic outcomes. 
(Evidence in the United States has been less clear 
about the effect of voucher programs on students’ 
success.) In the case of Colombia, the answer is un-
ambiguous—voucher winners’ outcomes improved 
relative to what they would have achieved in the ab-
sence of the voucher.   
 
The voucher program also improved outcomes for stu-
dents at vocational schools. Among students who ap-
plied to vocational schools prior to applying for the 
voucher, the program increased the likelihood of at-
tending vocational schools. Yet these schools were in-
ferior according to most academic standards. Why did 
these students do so well? Ongoing work by Bettinger, 
Kremer, and Saavedra (2005) investigates this. One 
potential explanation for the findings is the effect that 
the voucher program had on students’ incentives; stu-
dents lost the voucher if they did not pass a grade. The 
threat that the government would cancel a student’s 
voucher may have been enough to persuade the student 
to work harder in school. A recent series of economic 
papers have focused on understanding the effects of 
incentives on students (e.g., Angrist and Lavy 2002; 
Kremer and Miguel 2004). Families and students re-
spond to financial incentives, and these incentives may 
lead to better health and educational outcomes. 
 
In 1998, Colombia dissolved the voucher program. A 
new administration did not see the program as central to 
its educational initiatives and, at the time, there was no 
measure of the effectiveness of the program; the first 
evidence of its effectiveness didn’t come until 2002. As 
a result of the evidence on PACES, Colombia has re-
newed discussions with the World Bank about whether 
it should restart a voucher initiative.   
 
The Colombia voucher program provides a valuable 
social lesson: A randomized experiment can influence 
education policy. In recent years, the United States 
government has emphasized the role of evaluation of 
randomized policy interventions. Randomization is 
the “gold standard” in evaluation. While other meth-
odologies can provide hints of the effectiveness of a  
 
                       Eric Bettinger 
policy, they generally cannot provide irrefutable evi-
dence. Randomization, however, can provide defini-
tive evidence when the randomization is conducted 
properly. In the case of the Colombian vouchers, ran-
domization was used to assign the voucher to attain 
fairness: more people wanted the vouchers than there 
were vouchers available. Rather than assign vouchers 
based on previous performance, wealth, or other char-
acteristics, randomization ensured that each applicant 
had an equal chance. 
The definitiveness of the Colombian evidence has at-
tracted the attention of policymakers and academics 
alike. It has shown that vouchers do improve outcomes 
for students. It has also demonstrated, and provided a 
model for, how policies can be implemented using 
randomization and how the resulting evaluations can 
provide definitive evidence of a program’s efficacy. 
 
ENDNOTE 
 
1 This paper is largely based on “Vouchers for Private 
Schooling in Colombia: Evidence From a Random-
ized Natural Experiment” by Joshua D. Angrist, Eric 
Bettinger, Erik Bloom, Elizabeth King, and Michael 
Kremer (American Economic Review 2002) and 
“Long-Term Educational Consequences of Secon-
dary School Vouchers: Evidence from Administrative 
Records in Colombia” by Joshua D. Angrist, Eric 
Bettinger, and Michael Kremer (American Economic 
Review, forthcoming). 
 
REFERENCES 
 
Angrist, Joshua, Eric Bettinger, Erik Bloom, Eliza-
beth King, and Michael Kremer. 2002. “Vouch-
ers for Private Schooling in Colombia: Evidence 
from a Randomized Natural Experiment,” 
American Economic Review, 92 (5): 1535–58. 
 
Angrist, Joshua, Eric Bettinger, and Michael Kremer. 
Forthcoming. “Long-Term Educational Conse-
quences of Secondary School Vouchers: Evi-
dence from Administrative Records in Colom-
bia,” American Economic Review. 
 
Angrist, Joshua, and Victor Lavy. 2002. “The Effect 
of High School Matriculation Awards: Evidence 
from Randomized Trials,” NBER Working Pa-
per Number 9389. Cambridge, Mass.: National 
Bureau of Economic Research. 
 
Bettinger, Eric, Michael Kremer, and Juan Saavedra. 
2004. “How do Vouchers Work? Evidence from 
Colombia,” mimeo, Case Western Reserve 
University. 
King, Elizabeth, Laura Rawlings, Marybell Gutierrez, 
Carlos Pardo, and Carlos Torres. 1997. “Colom-
bia’s Targeted Education Voucher Program: 
Features, Coverage and Participation,” Working 
Paper No. 3, Series on Impact Evaluation of 
Education Reforms, Development Economics 
Research Group, The World Bank, September. 
 
Kremer, Michael, Edward Miguel, and Rebecca 
Thornton. 2004. “Incentives to Learn,” NBER 
Working Paper Number 10971. Cambridge, 
Mass.: National Bureau of Economic Research. 
 
Sanchez, Fabio, and Jairo Mendez. 1995. “Por Que 
los Niños Pobres No Van A La Escuela? 
(Determinantes de la asistencia escolar en 
Colombia),” mimeo, Departmento Nacional de 
Planeación Republica de Colombia. 
 
The World Bank. 1993.  Staff Appraisal Report: Colom-
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and the Caribbean Region, Report 11834-CO.  

How do Vouchers Work? Evidence from Colombia,” mimeo,

Incentives to Learn,” NBER Working Paper Number 10971.

Por Que los Niños Pobres No Van A La Escuela? (Determinantes de la asistencia escolar en Colombia),” mimeo, Departmento Nacional de Planeación Republica de Colombia.

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Lessons from private-school vouchers in Columbia

http://www.clevelandfed.org/research/conferences/2005/November/Papers/BettingerPaperFINALweb.pdf

Lessons from private-school vouchers in Columbia

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