separate ‘mixed’ households with children in both grade groups from ‘treatment’ households as they might experience different effects when not all of their children in the relevant grade range return to school. The main analysis sample includes 335 treatment, 361 mixed, and 948 control households.

Prior to the partial reopening, 98.5% of sample households stated that their children would return to school after schools reopened, despite possible concerns about the pandemic or conditions leading some children to drop out. Close to 99% of eligible students are reported to have returned to school after October 12, 2020.<sup>8</sup> Across all grades, 97% of children enrolled prior to the pandemic closures returned to school after the full reopening in January 2021.

Finally, the data include questions on household childcare arrangements, including respondent childcare hours.<sup>9</sup>

# **2.3 Childcare Arrangements**

At least 93% of children at each age from 6-16 in the RRPS are reported to have been enrolled in school in February 2020. After the March closures these children were all home requiring care and supervision during the working day, representing a large and unexpected shock to household childcare needs. Children primarily stayed at home with a parent during the closures (Figure A1), including situations where parents were simultaneously working. Almost no households report their children spending time with childcare providers outside the home or with a maid/domestic helper at home, and this does not vary by rural/urban setting or change as pandemic restrictions were relaxed and case numbers fluctuated. Adults with schoolchildren at home will have faced trade-offs in their allocation of time across childcare, work in different sectors, and other activities given a limited time budget to accommodate increased childcare burdens.

Figure 2 Panel A presents how hours of childcare from different providers (excluding schools) vary with the number of household children, using data from after schools fully reopened.

Non-household members provide very little childcare on average—86% of households with children report 0 hours of care from non-household members in the last 7 days. While childcare availability has been increasing in Kenya (particularly in urban areas), affordability remains a challenge for most households (Clark et al. 2021; Murungi 2013).

Other adults besides the parents are present in 37% of households with children, and on average provide around 10 hours per week of childcare. Siblings also play an important role in childcare (Jakiela et al. 2020). In households with at least 2 children 55% of children provided childcare to siblings in the last 7 days, for 15-20 hours on average in total, demonstrating how childcare burdens can also fall on household children. Sibling childcare hours may have been higher during school closures as school-age children were at home, but we only measure sibling childcare after the full

> 8. This may be overstated but is consistent with data from a survey of 3,000 grade 8 students in Busia County, Kenya, which shows that 97% of these students reported back to school after the partial reopening in October (Bonds 2021).

> 9. The survey asks about time spent on childcare in the last 7 days, but does not distinguish between time actively spent caring for a child and time spent on other activities while responsible for a child. We topcode reported childcare hours at 140, or 20 hours a day.

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