Las expectativas educativas de la población inmigrante en Navarra. ¿Optimismo inmigrante o efectos de escuela?

Abstract

In this paper we use the Evaluation Survey for Secondary Schooling conducted by the Regional Government of Navarra in 2010 to study migrant-native differentials in the educational expectation of students. Our evidence confirms the existence of what the international literature has labelled "immigrant optimism", in other words, the fact that immigrantorigin students are more ambitious than what should be expected according to their socioeconomic status or their prior school achievement. Once we identify this regularity, the paper explores the causes of this particular differential between migrants and natives suggesting that individual level characteristics (broadly speaking family level features) are the most plausible source of this optimism. The sorting of migrants in the Navarre school map and the school characteristics appears to be less relevant to understand this immigrant optimism.