Personnel Management and School Productivity: Evidence from India

Abstract: This paper uses two new datasets to study management and productivity in primary schools in India. We report four main sets of results. First, management quality in public schools is low on average, but there is meaningful variation across public schools that is correlated with both independent measures of teaching practice, as well as measures of student value added. Second, we find higher management scores in private schools, and this advantage is mainly driven by differences in people management (as opposed to operations management). Third, we find that the private school advantage over public schools in student value-added is largely accounted for by differences in people management practices. Fourth, we find that the private-school advantage in measures of people management is consistent with independent measures of personnel policy. Specifically, private school teacher pay is positively correlated with measures of teacher value-added, and private schools are more likely to retain teachers with higher value-addition and let go teachers with lower value-addition. Neither pattern is seen in public schools.