https://www.knowledge.unibocconi.eu/notizia.php?idArt=23741

MARA SQUICCIARINI OBTAINED AN ERC STARTING GRANT FOR A QUANTITATIVE HISTORY PROJECT FOCUSING ON FRANCE FROM THE 1789 FRENCH REVOLUTION TO THE 1900S

Free and universal education is considered a major achievement and a crucial factor for economic development, but it continues to be anything but, well, universal. Still today, many countries do not guarantee full access to education, religious minorities often face restricted learning opportunities, and top educational institutions are being dismantled if they dissent from governments' policies.
 
Mara Squicciarini, Assistant Professor at Bocconi Department of Economics, obtained a €1.46mln European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant to study the drivers and consequences of educational expansion, the patterns of inclusion of religious minorities in the school system, and the effect of closing down a high-quality educational institution on innovation and politics. She will study these phenomena through the lenses of quantitative economic history, focusing on France from the 1789 French Revolution to the 1900s, a period of key educational reforms, crucial for French and, more broadly, European modernization.