Seasonal Pattern In Education

Although most schools admit students born in the beginning of the year at an older age,
school start age policy vary across states and school districts within many states
The variation between school start age policies can be seen within Australia itself, in
which different states/territories have different requirements to the commencement
age for enrolment in year 1 as shown in the table below.

State/Territory

Preparatory year
(first year of
school)
Month of and age at
commencement for Year 1
Primary
schooling
Secondary
schooling
Minimum school
leaving age
New South Wales Kindergarten January, 5 turning 6 by 31
July
Kindergarten
Years 16
Years 712 15 years
(a)

Victoria Preparatory January, 5 turning 6 by 30
April
Preparatory
Years 16
Years 712 16 years
(b)

Queensland Preparatory
(c)
January, 5 turning 6 by 31
July
Preparatory
Years 17
Years 812 17 years
(d)

South Australia Reception January, 5 years 6 months by
1 January
Reception
Years 17
Years 812 16 years
(e)

Western Australia Pre-primary January, 5 turning 6 by 30
June
Pre-primary
Years 17
Years 812 17 years
(f)

Tasmania Preparatory January, turning 6 by 1
January
Preparatory
Years 16
Years 712 17 years
(g)

Northern Territory Transition January, 5 turning 6 by 30
June
Transition
Years 16
Years 712
(h)
15 years
(i)

Australian Capital
Territory
Kindergarten January, 5 turning 6 by 30
April
Kindergarten
Years 16
Years 712 15 years
(j)



Therefore, because compulsory schooling constrains some students to remain in school
until their birthday, the relationship between education and seasonal birth is expected
to vary among states that have different start age policies.
To incorporate for cross-state seasonal variation in education, TSLS estimates that were
used as instruments for education were computed as shown in the table below.
Table VII below presents the TSL and OSL estimates of the new specification for the
sample of 40-49 year old men in the 1980 census.
The table below shows the estimates to the return on education for 40 49 year old
men from the 1980 census.

By comparing the TSLS and OSL estimates of table 7 with table 5, we can conclude
that the return to education is much more significant when state of birth dummies
are included into the sample. This can be mainly due to the different minimum
compulsory schooling required by each state.



Table VII below shows the estimates of the return to education for the sample of
black men born in 1930-1939.

Both the TSLS and OSL estimates of black men born in 1930-1939 indicate that the
return to education is lower for black men compared to the entire male population as
shown in table IV.
Other Possible Effects Of Seasonal Birth
The effect of age at school entry on education achievement:
- Several educational psychologist have suggested that children born in the
beginning of the year are better students because they are older than their
classmates.
However, this evidence has been found to be less convincing in recent times
as recent studies done show that this effect only lasts at an early age but
soon diminishes thereafter. This can be seen in the study done by National
Foundation for Educational Research in which the results found were as shown
in the table below :

Cohort Year Age SD Effect size (ES) N
1
1988
1990
6
8
-6.13
-3.12
12.9210.81 -0.47-0.29 0.19*** 2111
2
1988
1990
8
10
-3.69
-3.22
10.6610.20 -0.32 0.03(NS) 2031
3
1988
1990
10
12
-2.82
-1.45
9.349.03 -0.30-0.16 0.14** 1436
The socioeconomic status of the childs parents:
- If the season of birth were related to the socioeconomic status of the
childrens parents, one might expect to find a connection between season of
birth and education.
- This is in which as more parents are opting for family planning based on their
socioeconomic status, there is an evident link between the seasonal birth of
the child and the education level.
The effect of the season of birth on the earnings of college graduates, a
sample whose schooling was not prolonged by compulsory attendance.
- If the season of birth affects education for a reason other than compulsory
schooling, (e.g., psychological effects of school start age), we would expect
the season of birth to be related to the earnings for this sample. But in the
case of this journal article, it was found that quarter of birth has no effect on
earnings for college graduates.