On gender differences in higher education in Turkey

In Turkey, as in many other countries, gender gap in participation in education has remained persistent even though female students have been outperforming male students in terms of many measures of educational outcomes. The aim of this thesis is to provide an overview of the trends in gender gap in educational attainment in particular in higher education in Turkey and to elaborate their potential causes and consequences. The analysis of gender differences in educational outcomes, enrollment decisions and preferences for higher education programs, the centralized standardized test based university entrance system is used as a tool to design the empirical approach. First, I show that in Turkey, as in many other countries, female students perform better in high school and have higher test scores than males and are more likely to enroll in higher education programs controlling for test scores. Nevertheless, men still predominate at highly selective programs that lead to high-paying careers. The gender gap at elite schools is particularly puzzling because college admissions are based entirely on nationwide exam scores. Secondly, using detailed unique administrative data from the centralized college entrance system, I also study the impact of gender differences in preferences for programs and schools on the allocation of students to colleges. Controlling for test score and high school attended, I find that females are more likely to apply to lower-ranking schools, whereas males set a higher bar, revealing a higher option value for re-taking the test and applying again next year. Finally, I also document the gender differences in preferences for university program attributes. I find that females and males value program attributes differently, with females placing more weight on the distance from home to college, and males placing more weight on program attributes that are likely to lead to better job placements. Together, these differences in willingness to be unassigned and in relative preferences for school attributes can explain much of the gender gap at the most elite programs which has important implications for the persistency of gender wage gap and occupational differences in Turkish labor market in spite of the improvements in gender gap in educational achievements.