Code for Advisor Value-Added and Student Outcomes: Evidence from Randomly Assigned College Advisors

Principal Investigator(s): View help for Principal Investigator(s) Serena Canaan, American University of Beirut; Simon Fraser University; Antoine Deeb, UC Santa Barbara; Pierre Mouganie, American University of Beirut; Simon Fraser University

Version: View help for Version V1

Name	File Type	Size	Last Modified
Package to Upload			07/13/2021 01:00:PM

Project Citation:

Canaan, Serena, Deeb, Antoine, and Mouganie, Pierre. Code for Advisor Value-Added and Student Outcomes: Evidence from Randomly Assigned College Advisors. Nashville, TN: American Economic Association [publisher], 2022. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2022-10-20. https://doi.org/10.3886/E142321V1

Project Description

Summary: This paper provides the first causal evidence on the impact of college advisor quality on student outcomes. To do so, we exploit a unique setting where students are randomly assigned to faculty advisors during their first year of college. We estimate advisor valued-added (VA) based on students’ first-year course grades. We find that having a higher grade VA advisor reduces time to complete freshman year and increases four-year graduation rates by 2.5 percentage points. It also raises high-ability students' likelihood of enrolling and graduating with a STEM degree by 4 percentage points. The magnitudes of our estimated effects are comparable to those from successful financial aid programs and proactive coaching interventions. We also show that non-grade measures of advisor VA predict student success. In particular, advisors who are effective at improving students’ persistence and major choice also boost other college outcomes. Our results indicate that allocating resources towards improving the quality of academic advising may play a key role in promoting college success.

Scope of Project

Subject Terms: STEM; Academic Advising ; Value-Added; College Completion

JEL Classification:
      I21 Analysis of Education
      I23 Higher Education; Research Institutions
      I24 Education and Inequality

Geographic Coverage: Lebanon

Time Period(s): 2003 – 2016

Universe: Students at the American University of Beirut

Data Type(s): program source code

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Published Versions

V1 [2022-10-20]

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