Closing Information Gap to Improve Student Attendance and Learning Outcomes in Primary School in Tanzania

Student absenteeism presents a major challenge to the government in improving educational outcomes in sub-Saharan Africa despite the efforts to address the problem undertaken by the African governments over the past decade. Information asymmetry between students' behavior and their parents' knowledge about these behaviors contributes to increased moral hazards among children, leading to low school attendance. Improving communication between schools and parents is therefore considered an effective method to minimize the problem. In this study, the researchers plan to conduct a school-level cluster randomized controlled trial to assess the impact of closing the information gap between students and parents on student attendance and learning outcomes in Tanzania. The intervention is designed to have three treatment arms; (T1: receive a text message at the end of the week about the student’s class attendance. T2: receive a text message on a student's attendance and a follow-up student school attendance behavior message from the local leader. T3: receive a text message on student attendance + participation in a simple lottery with attendance as eligibility criteria) and a control group (T0: Receives nothing).