Do school reforms shape study behavior at university? Evidence from an instructional time reform

TL;DR

This study investigates how a staggered school reform in Germany, which reduced school years and increased instructional time, affected university students' study behaviors and timing of higher education entry.

Contribution

It provides empirical evidence on the long-term effects of school reforms on university study behavior using a large-scale quasi-experimental analysis.

Findings

Reform exposure decreased hours spent on classes and self-study.

Reform increased the time gap between school completion and university entry.

Long-term unintended effects of school reforms on individual life courses.

Abstract

Early-life environments can have long-lasting developmental effects. Interestingly, research on how school reforms affect later-life study behavior has hardly adopted this perspective. Therefore, we investigated a staggered school reform that reduced the number of school years and increased weekly instructional time for secondary school students in most German federal states. We analyzed this quasi-experiment in a difference-in-differences framework using representative large-scale survey data on 71,426 students who attended university between 1998 and 2016. We found negative effects of reform exposure on hours spent attending classes and on self-study, and a larger time gap between school completion and higher education entry. Our results support the view that research should examine unintended long-term effects of school reforms on individual life courses.