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Despite a sharp increase in the share of girls who enroll in, attend, and complete various levels of schooling, an educational gender gap remains in some countries. This paper argues that one explanation for this gender gap is the degree of social exclusion within these countries, as indicated by ethno-linguistic heterogeneity, which triggers both economic and psycho-social mechanisms to limit girls' schooling. Ethno-linguistic heterogeneity initially was applied to explaining lagging economic growth, but has emerged in the literature more recently to explain both civil conflict and public goods. This paper is a first application of the concept to explain gender gaps in education. The paper discusses the importance of female education for economic and social development, reviews the evidence regarding gender and ethnic differences in schooling, reviews the theoretical perspectives of various social science disciplines that seek to explain such differences, and tests the relevance of ethnic and linguistic heterogeneity in explaining cross-country differences in school attainment and learning. The study indicates that within-country ethnic and linguistic heterogeneity partly explains both national female primary school completion rates and gender differences in these rates, but only explains average national learning outcomes when national income measures are excluded.

Completion rates --- Disability --- Education --- Education for All --- Effective Schools and Teachers --- Female education --- Gender --- Gender and Education --- Gender Gap --- Girls --- Human Development --- Learning --- Primary Education --- Primary school --- Primary school completion --- Schooling --- Social development --- Social Protections and Labor

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This paper aims to identify the major drop-out and push-out factors that lead to school abandonment in an urban surrounding-the shantytowns of Fortaleza, Northeast Brazil. The authors use an extensive survey addressing risk factors faced by the population in these neighborhoods, which cover both in-school and out-of-school youth of both genders. They focus on the role of early parenthood, child labor, and poverty in pushing teenagers out of school. The potential endogeneity of some of the determinants is dealt with in the empirical analysis. The authors take advantage of the rich set of variables available and apply an instrumental variables approach. Early parenthood is instrumented with the age declared by the youngsters as the ideal age to start having sexual relationships. Work is instrumented using the declared reservation wage (minimum salary acceptable to work). Results indicate that early parenthood has a strong impact of driving teenagers out of school. Extreme poverty is another factor lowering school attendance, as children who have suffered hunger at some point in their lives are less likely to attend school. In this particular urban context, working does not necessarily have a detrimental effect on school attendance, which could be linked to the fact that dropping out of school leads most often to inactivity and not to work.

Adolescent Health --- Birth Rates --- Children and Youth --- Completion Rates --- Disability --- Education --- Education for All --- Elementary Education --- Enrollment Rates --- First Grade --- Grade Repetition --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- High School --- High School Diploma --- Low Educational Attainment --- Population Policies --- Primary Education --- Primary Education System --- School --- School Attendance --- School Day --- School Drop --- School Leavers --- School Year --- Schooling --- Social Protections and Labor --- Street Children --- Tertiary Education --- Universal Enrollment --- Urban Development --- Youth and Government

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The youth unemployment rate is exceptionally high in developing countries. Because the quality of education is arguably one of the most important determinants of youth's labor force participation, governments worldwide have responded by creating job training and placement services programs. Despite the rapid expansion of skill-enhancement employment programs across the world and the long history of training program evaluations, debates about the causal impact of training-based labor market policies on employment outcomes still persist. Using a quasi-experimental approach, this report presents the short-run effects of skills training and employment placement services in Nepal. Launched in 2009, the intervention provided skills training and employment placement services for more than 40,000 Nepalese youth over a three-year period, including a specialized adolescent girls' initiative that reached 4,410 women ages 16 to 24. The report finds that after three years of the program, the Employment Fund intervention positively improved employment outcomes. Participation in the Employment Fund training program generated an increase in non-farm employment of 15 to 16 percentage points for an overall gain of about 50 percent. The program also generated an average monthly earnings gain of about 72 percent. The report finds significantly larger employment impacts for women than for men, but younger women ages 16 to 24 experienced the same improvements as older females. These employment estimates are comparable, although somewhat higher, than other recent experimental interventions in developing countries.

Abuse --- Access & Equity in Basic Education --- Adolescent Girls --- Both Sexes --- Capacity Building --- Childbirth --- Children --- Civil Conflict --- Classroom --- Completion Rates --- Contraception --- Control Over Resources --- Curriculum --- Developing Countries --- Development Policy --- Disadvantaged Groups --- Discrimination --- Dropout --- Dropout Rates --- Early Intervention --- Economic Empowerment --- Economic Growth --- Economic Resources --- Economic Status --- Education --- Education for All --- Educational Attainment --- Employment Opportunities --- Enrollment --- Ethnic Groups --- Ex-Combatants --- Exams --- Female Participants --- Female Students --- Fertility --- Fertility Preferences --- Finance and Financial Sector Development --- Financial Literacy --- Food Insecurity --- Food Security --- Formal Education --- Gender Differences --- Gender Discrimination --- Gender Equality --- Girls --- Groups --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- HIV --- Household Assets --- Household Food Security --- Household Income --- Household Level --- Household Size --- Human Capital --- Important Policy --- Income-Generating Activities --- Indigenous Peoples --- International Labor Organization --- Interventions --- Investment --- Job Opportunities --- Job Training --- Knowledge --- Labor Force --- Labor Market --- Labour Market --- Leadership --- Learning --- Level of Education --- Life Skills --- Literacy --- Livelihood Skills --- Mandates --- Marital Status --- Marriage --- Meat --- Migrants --- Migration --- Ministry of Education --- Minority --- Number of Children --- Older Women --- Outreach Activities --- Participation --- Pensions --- Physical Health --- Pilot Projects --- Policy --- Policy Discussions --- Policy Implications --- Policy Makers --- Policy Research --- Policy Research Working Paper --- Population --- Population Policies --- Practitioners --- Pregnancy --- Primary Education --- Progress --- Public Health --- Quality of Education --- Radio --- Reasoning --- Regular Attendance --- Remittances --- Reproductive Health --- Science --- Self-Confidence --- Service Delivery --- Service Providers --- Sex --- Sexually Active --- Skills --- Skills Development --- Skills Training --- Social Norms --- Social Science --- Sponsors --- Students --- Substance Abuse --- Technical Education --- Technical Skills --- Technical Training --- Training --- Training Opportunities --- Training Programs --- Training Services --- Unemployment --- Values --- Vocational Education --- Vocational Training --- Vulnerability --- Vulnerable Groups --- Women --- Workshops --- Young Men --- Young People --- Young Women --- Youth