TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Pavese, Caterina
AU  - Meulen, Simon ter
AU  - Woessmann, Ludger
        TI  - Integrated vs. Separated Schooling for Refugee Children: Long-Term Effects on Education and Assimilation
        PY  - 2026/Sep/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 18979
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp18979
        AB  - Does direct integration into native schools or temporary placement in separate schools better promote the education and cultural assimilation of refugee children? In the Netherlands, primary-school-aged refugee children are placed in either integrated or separated schools depending on their randomly assigned municipality. By contrast, all secondary-school-aged arrivals are initially separated. We exploit this institutional setting in two-way fixed-effects models with age-at-arrival and municipality fixed effects. Using rich administrative data, we find that integrated schooling reduces educational attainment at age 18, particularly for children of lower-educated parents. At the same time, integrated schooling increases cultural assimilation, measured by hormonal-contraceptive usage among teenage women, particularly for children from non-Muslim-majority countries. A distinctive feature of separated schooling that may account for its positive educational effect is that it allows employing teachers specialized in native-language teaching for non-native speakers.
        KW  - refugee children
KW  - schools
KW  - integration
KW  - educational attainment
KW  - contraceptives
        ER  -