Educational Outcomes of Children of Migrants who Stay in the Country of Origin: Comparative Evidence from Ghana, Nigeria, and Angola

Parental migration is found to have contrasting effects on children’s educational outcomes in countries in Asia and Latin America. Different indicators are used, which may explain some of the divergences, but this also indicates the importance of context. We examine educational outcomes among children in 3 African countries and add to the literature in several ways, by: providing information about African cases, missing in the literature; using several measures of educational outcomes to test if results differ according to indicator used; and providing a cross-country comparison, to understand the role of context-specific factors. A survey is conducted amongst junior and secondary school children in Ghana (N=2760), Angola (N=2243), and Nigeria (N=2168). Educational outcomes are measured as class repetition, level of school enjoyment among children, and an index of pupils’ marks. We control for family, child, living, and migration characteristics. We compare children in migrant and non-migrant families. Preliminary results reveal that in Ghana and Nigeria children are prone to repeat a class when their mother or both parents have migrated nationally or internationally, while in Angola the opposite is observed. Furthermore, the results find limited evidence to link material deprivation with negative educational performance.