Origins of the Demand for Education:Evidence from Early Schools in Nigeria

This paper investigates the selection of students into attending the first primary schools in Nigeria, between 1845 and 1926, as well as the effect that these schools had on intergenerational mobility and social connections. The text covers both the first generation of students and their contemporaries, and their descendants in the second generation. Those who attended the first school in their area did better economically, spoke more languages, and were more likely to have friendships with people who were white, foreign, or otherwise outside of their ethnic group. Even though descendants of first-generation subjects in the control group started catching up and were substantially more likely to attend school, many of the differences persisted into the second generation. Modest evidence for heterogeneity in these differences by gender was found.