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Léa Dousset le 15/05/2025

"The End of a Gender Quota in Elite Higher Education" avec Léa Dousset doctorante à l'Ecole d’Economie de Paris.
Quand ? Le 15/05/2025,
de 11:45 à 13:00
S'adresser à Estelle Herbaut
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Pour la quatrième et dernière séance du cycle de séminaires interdisciplinaires jeunes chercheur.e.s "Saisir les inégalités scolaires par les méthodes quantitatives", nous accueillons

Léa Dousset 
doctorante à l'École d'Économie de Paris

le 5 mai 2025 à 11h45

Salle D2.128 à l'ENS Lyon, ou à distance (inscription obligatoire)

The End of a Gender Quota in Elite Higher Education
Article co-écrit avec Georgia Thebault (Université Paris Dauphine)

Can gender quotas in elite higher education help close the gender gap in math-intensive fields? We use original hand-collected historical data from the entrance exam of one of France's most competitive graduate schools and exploit a sudden change in admission policy that removed a hard gender-based quota system. We document that the end of the quota led to a sharp drop in the percentage of admitted female candidates, but only in math-intensive fields. We then focus on the mathematics entrance exam to delve into the mechanisms. We show that half of this decline is explained by a mechanical gender performance gap. Strikingly, the other half can be attributed to a behavioral response: after the quota was lifted, there was a decrease in the supply of female candidates at the entrance exam, and this decline was concentrated among high-potential female candidates. This turning-away mechanism reveals the unintended consequences of removing gender quotas in real-world competitive contexts. As this elite graduate school leads to high-level academic careers in France, we show that the removal of the gender quota increased the gender gap in academic careers for affected students.