Becoming a Teacher: Experimental Evidence from an Information Intervention

with Mariana Alfonso, Matías Busso, Hugo R. Ñopo, and Antonella Rivera

International Journal of Educational Development. Volume 118. October, 2025

Education systems seeking to improve outcomes must attract, develop, and retain highly effective teachers. A critical challenge is making the teaching profession appealing to talented youth. This paper presents evidence from an experiment in Peru, where we provided high school seniors with information about recent reforms to the teaching career. We find positive, though modest, effects on both the intensive and extensive margins: treated students were more likely to choose an education major and to enroll in higher education. While the intervention increased the number of prospective teachers, it did not substantially alter the profile of those entering the profession. These findings suggest that career incentives and information can influence students’ decisions, though broader changes to the composition of the future teaching workforce may require additional, complementary interventions.

The Price of Faith: Economic Costs and Religious Adaptation in Sub-Saharan Africa

with Eduardo Montero, and Dean Yang

R&R, The Quarterly Journal of Economics

How do economic costs affect religious choices, and how do religious institutions adapt to economic realities? We study the Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) church in Sub-Saharan Africa, which prohibits production of tobacco, coffee, and tea, creating opportunity costs for potential members in areas suitable for these crops. We construct a measure of SDA membership opportunity cost that varies over time and space based on local crop suitability and export prices. Using church administrative data and member surveys, we find that increased opportunity costs lead to lower membership growth and lower satisfaction with the church among existing members. Higher opportunity costs also cause establishment of new SDA educational and health institutions; church members to perceive less messaging about “healthy living” religious tenets; and higher church member consumption of prohibited goods. These findings provide new insights into the microeconomics of cultural change, as mediated by religious institutions. Religious organizations can show striking flexibility in balancing tradition and adaptation when faced with economic pressures.

The Roots of Faith: Early Life Droughts and Religious Commitment

September, 2025

Religion is a fundamental aspect of societal norms and values, yet its interplay with environmental shocks, particularly in the context of climate vulnerability, remains underexplored. This study investigates the long-term impact of drought exposure on religious expression and group affiliation in African countries. Using individual-level data from the Afrobarometer survey across over 30 nations, I exploit variation in drought exposure based on age and location, finding that individuals exposed to stronger droughts are more likely to be members of a religious group and actively participate. While a short-run effect is present for adults, the analysis reveals a persistent, long-term impact driven specifically by exposure during the formative teenage years. These findings are complemented by evidence that teenage drought exposure is also associated with a greater likelihood of obtaining formal education, working in agriculture, and trusting community-based institutions, suggesting a broad adaptation strategy.

Seats Without Applicants: A Gender Quota in College Admissions

Status: In Progress

Can reserved seats draw women into STEM, or only re-shuffle those already applying? I study Chile's "More Women Scientists" (Más Mujeres Científicas) policy, which since 2024 has attached supernumerary women-only seats to hundreds of STEM programs in the national centralized admissions system. The quota mostly fails to bind: universities filled only 47.5% of reserved seats in the first year, and 42% of covered programs awarded none — there were no eligible women on the waitlists to take them. Yet the policy moved demand where it did not move seats: the female share of applications to covered programs rose by 1.9 percentage points against ten flat pre-policy years — robust across estimators, inference levels, and placebos on future adopters. The mechanism is an invitation, not a price: the response is flat in applicants' own admission odds, and new seats move applications while re-announcing existing ones does not. Replaying the assignment algorithm shows the filled seats placed 596 additional women in STEM in 2024, made no student worse off, and — through vacancy chains — delivered a third of their downstream benefits to men. Within fields, coverage re-sorts a fixed pool across universities; system-wide, the pool grows by roughly 1,800 female STEM applicants per year beyond trend, with no male discouragement. The binding margin is placement, not budget: the same seats, located where eligible women already queue, would raise the policy's output by half.

The Transmission Technology: Migration and Ethnic Identity

Status: In Progress

University of Michigan

University of Michigan

Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria

Universidad de Chile