"First Generation Elite: The Role of School Social Networks"
Emma Tominey (University of York)
Abstract: High school students from non-elite backgrounds are less likely to have peers with elite educated
parents than their elite counterparts in Norway. We show this difference in social capital is a key driver of the high intergenerational persistence in elite education. We identify a positive elite peer effect on enrolment in elite programmes and disentangle underlying mechanisms. Exploiting
a lottery in the assessment system, a causal mediation analysis shows the overall positive peer effect reflects a positive effect on application behaviour (conditional on GPA), which dominates a negative effect on student GPA. We consider implications for income mobility finding that
encouraging further mixing between elite and non-elite students in high school could improve mobility across the whole distribution.
The seminar takes place from 14:15 to 15:30 in room S3/4 in the Oeconomicum (building 24.31).
You can find Emma’s website here: https://sites.google.com/a/york.ac.uk/emma-tominey/home?authuser=0.
She will be available for individual meetings in the morning on the day of the seminar. Giulia and Yihan will coordinate the schedule. Please use the following Google sheet if you want to reserve a slot: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-a4aLpgf7Lknu25by0q-j3af2W1J-giuDA6l7252E44/edit#gid=0.