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We present experimental evidence on the impact of a technology-aided after-school instruction program on learning outcomes in middle school grades in urban India, using a lottery that provided students with a voucher to cover program costs. A key feature of the program was its ability to individually customize educational content to match the level and rate of progress of each student. We find that lottery winners had large increases in test scores of 0.36σ in math and 0.22σ in Hindi over just a 4.5-month period. IV estimates suggest that attending the program for 90 days would increase math and Hindi test scores by 0.59σ and 0.36σ respectively. We find similar absolute test score gains for all students, but the relative gain was much greater for academically-weaker students because their rate of learning in the control group was close to zero. We show that the program precisely targets instruction to students' preparation level, thus catering effectively to the very wide variation in student learning levels within a single grade. The program was highly cost-effective, both in terms of productivity per dollar and unit of time. Our results suggest that well-designed technology-aided instruction programs can sharply improve productivity in delivering education.
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Nanobiotechnology is the application of nanotechnology in biological fields. Nanobiotechnology is a multidisciplinary field that currently engages researchers in conventional as well as advanced avenues of engineering and natural sciences.The recent developments in nanobiotechnology have impacted various socio-economic sectors, including medical, agriculture, food, textile, and other industries. Although the integration of nanomaterials with biology has led to the development of diagnostic devices, contrast agents, analytical tools, therapy, and drug-delivery vehicles, bionanotechnology research is still in its infancy. The full potential of developments in this field have yet to be realized. This book discusses various nano-engineered materials or nanocarriers that are used in different situations. It presents 8 chapters that cover the application of nanobiomaterials in environmental remediation, nanofertilisers, nanobiotics against antimicrobial resistance, nanobiosensors in pathogen detection, and nanotoxicity assessments. Each chapter is structured into easy-to-read sections that explain fundamental and applied concepts of nanobiomaterials. Readers will gain a current view of the biotechnological application of modern nanomaterials and nanoparticles. The book is intended to be a primer for students and researchers in agriculture, biotechnology, and biomedical engineering courses.
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We present results from a large-scale experimental evaluation of an ambitious attempt to improve management quality in Indian schools (implemented in 1,774 randomly-selected schools). The intervention featured several global "best practices" including comprehensive assessments, detailed school ratings, and customized school improvement plans. It did not, however, change accountability or incentives. We find that the assessments were near-universally completed, and that the ratings were informative, but the intervention had no impact on either school functioning or student outcomes. Yet, the program was perceived to be successful and scaled up to cover over 600,000 schools nationally. We find using a matched-pair design that the scaled-up program continued to be ineffective at improving student learning in the state we study. We also conduct detailed qualitative interviews with frontline officials and find that the main impact of the program on the ground was to increase required reporting and paperwork. Our results illustrate how ostensibly well-designed programs, that appear effective based on administrative measures of compliance, may be ineffective in practice.
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We use a panel survey of ~19,000 primary-school-aged children in rural Tamil Nadu to study 'learning loss' after COVID-19-induced school closures, and the pace of recovery after schools reopened. Students tested in December 2021 (18 months after school closures) displayed learning deficits of ~0.7σ standard deviations in math and ~0.34σ standard deviations in language compared to identically-aged students in the same villages in 2019. Two-thirds of this deficit was made up within 6 months after school reopening. Further, while learning loss was regressive, the recovery was progressive. A government-run after-school remediation program contributed ~24% of the cohort-level recovery, and likely aided the progressive recovery.
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We present experimental evidence on the impact of a personalized technology-aided after-school instruction program on learning outcomes. Our setting is middle-school grades in urban India, where a lottery provided winning students with a voucher to cover program costs. We find that lottery winners scored 0.36σ higher in math and 0.22σ higher in Hindi relative to lottery losers after just 4.5-months of access to the program. IV estimates suggest that attending the program for 90 days would increase math and Hindi test scores by 0.59σ and 0.36σ respectively. We find similar absolute test score gains for all students, but the relative gain was much greater for academically-weaker students because their rate of learning in the control group was close to zero. We show that the program was able to effectively cater to the very wide variation in student learning levels within a single grade by precisely targeting instruction to the level of student preparation. The program was cost effective, both in terms of productivity per dollar and unit of time. Our results suggest that well-designed technology-aided instruction programs can sharply improve productivity in delivering education.
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