Educational inequalities in Latin America, PISA 2012: causes of differences in school performance between public and private schools

The paper analyses and explains the causes of the differences in school performance between public and private schools in Latin America. It uses information from the 8 Latin American countries that participated in PISA 2012. The estimations, two steps with instrumental variables, combined with the technique of the Oaxaca-Blinder's decomposition, reveal that Uruguay and Brazil had the highest education gap, and Colombia and Mexico the lowest. These differences are explained, mainly, by the observed component of the model. Specifically, the differences in individual characteristics explain the greater proportion of the gaps in performance; followed by family characteristics and resources of the schools. In addition, the decomposition in the no-observed component suggests that students from private schools make better use of the educational resources, both in their homes and in their schools.