program school; 80.2 percent of recipients, but only 57.9 percent of non-recipients were attending a JFPR school on the day of the visit; for those whose enrollment status could be established, 89.5 percent of scholarship recipients but only 76.5 percent of non-recipients were enrolled in any school, JFPR or otherwise.<sup>2</sup> Table 1 is consistent with a large program effect on school enrollment and attendance.

We next focus on comparisons of outcomes for girls with different levels of socioeconomic status, as measured by their score. In our sample, girls ranked 45 or lower by the score were 4.3 percentage points more likely to be enrolled at a JFPR school than girls ranked 46 or higher (p-value: 0.04); 3.9 percentage points more likely to be present on the day of the school visit (p-value: 0.08); and 2.0 percentage points more likely to be enrolled at any school, JFPR or otherwise (p-value: 0.29). Note that we would expect that, in the absence of a program, girls with lower SES would be _less_ likely to be enrolled and attending school. These comparisons, which abstract from any possible endogeneity of scholarship receipt, therefore provide further evidence of a JFPR program effect.

Finally, we calculate the mean enrollment and attendance levels, separately for scholarship recipients and non-recipients, by deciles of the score. These results are presented in Figure 1. The lines corresponding to girls who were turned down for scholarships show that, among these girls, there are clear socioeconomic gradients in enrollment and attendance. Figure 2 presents a similar figure based on the 2000 Demographic and Health Survey; here too there is a clear schooling gradient.<sup>3</sup> Figure 1 shows, however, that the gradient in enrollment and attendance has essentially disappeared among scholarship recipients. This is consistent with larger program effects among girls with the lowest SES, a point we examine more carefully below.

# **3. Empirical strategy**

The empirical strategy in this paper is based on comparisons between scholarship recipients (the “treatment” group) and non-recipients (the “control” group). The analysis begins with OLS regressions of a dummy variable that takes on the value of one if girl i is enrolled in school at the time of the followup survey (in the enrollment regressions) or attending school (in the attendance regressions), Yit, on a set

> 2 Comparisons for the full sample of girls, not just those with completed applications, also suggest that scholarship recipients were more likely to be enrolled and attending school: In the full sample, the difference in the probability of enrollment at a JFPR school is 22.1 percentage points; the difference in the probability of attending is 21.9 percentage; and the difference in the probability of enrollment at any school, not just a JFPR school, is 12.1 percentage points.  All these differences are significant at the 1 percent level or better.

> 3 The exact list of socioeconomic variables in the DHS is not identical to that on the JFPR application form.  We derive the index of socioeconomic status in the DHS from variables describing: the ownership of a bicycle, cart, boat, motorbike, car, truck, radio, television; the conditions of the dwelling such as hard roofing and finished flooring; the availability of electric lighting; the main source of drinking water; the type of toilet facilities; and the main type of cooking fuel used.

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