Does Simple Information Provision Lead to More Diverse Classrooms? Evidence from a Field Experiment on Undergraduate Economics

This paper reports the results of a field experiment involving 2,710 students across nine US colleges, in which faculty provided incoming women and URM students with information about economics. We randomly assign students to one of three conditions: a control (no email messaging), a Welcome treatment (two emails encouraging students to consider enrolling in economics courses), and a Welcome+Info treatment (which added information showcasing the diversity of research and researchers within economics). The Welcome+Info treatment increases the likelihood of completing an economics course in the first semester of college by 3.0 percentage points, nearly 20 percent of the base rate.