Incentives from curriculum tracking

Curriculum tracking creates incentives in the years before its start, and we should therefore expect test scores to be higher during those years. I find robust evidence for incentive effects of tracking in the UK based on the UK comprehensive school reform. Results from the Swedish comprehensive school reform are inconclusive. Internationally, I find a large and widening test score gap between early and late tracking countries. Incentive effects of tracking show how early age scores can be endogenous with respect to later-age policies, and add to a growing literature on incentives in education.

► Curriculum tracking should create incentives before its start. ► I find evidence for this using three different data sets. ► Educational test scores can be endogenous with respect to later age policies. ► Institutional incentives matter at young ages as well.