Full professor at the University of Bologna from september 2020, she carries out her research in the field of applied micro-econometrics (mainly casual inference), education and labour economics. In the recent years her main research interests focused on evidence-based investments in young children and families. The current projects are aimed at the design and evaluation of interventions targeting families of young children, the impact assessment of on-going programs (Girls Code it Better aimed at secondary school students) and the development of methodological tools in the field of causal inference.
Education
She received a PhD in Applied Statistics in Economic and Social Sciences from the University of Padua and was Marie Curie Early Training Fellow (Institute for Social and Economic Research-ISER, Essex).
Academic career
After a few years as a research fellow first at the University of Padua then as Max Weber Fellow at the European University Institute, in 2007 she became Assistant Professor in Econometrics at the Department of Economics of the University of Bologna. At the same Department, she became Associate Professor in Economics 2014 and she joined the Department as Full Professor in Economics in september 2020.
Selected publications
(for the full list, please visit: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=zV0-jCcAAAAJ&hl=en)
- Fort, M., Ichino, A. and Zanella, G. (2020) Cognitive and non-cognitive costs of daycare 0-2 for children in advantaged families Journal of Political Economy
- Ballatore, R.M. Ichino, A. and Fort, M. (2018) The Tower of Babel in the Classroom: Immigrants and Natives in Italian Schools Journal of Labor Economics
- Fort, M. Manaresi, F. and Trucchi, S. (2016)Adult financial literacy and households’ financial assets: the role of bank information policies” Economic Policy
- Fort, M.; Schneeweis, N.; Winter-Ebmer, R. (2016), Is Education Always Reducing Fertility? Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Reforms, The Economic Journal
- Brunello, G. and Fort, M. and Schneeweis, N. and Winter-Ebmer, R. (2016) The Causal Effect of Education on Health: What is the Role of Health Behaviours? Health Economics 25 (3), pp 314–336.
- Brunello, G. and Fabbri, D. and Fort, M. (2013) The Causal Effect of Education on the Body Mass Journal of Labor Economics
- Brunello, G. and Fort, M. and Weber, G. (2009) Changes in Compulsory Schooling, Education and the Distribution of Wages in Europe The Economic Journal
Scientific activity
She took part in numerous national and international research programs being the principal investigator or local unit P.I. for the following projects:
- Gender Differences in STEM: Can Teaching Girls to Close Code the Gap ? (Spencer Foundation Small Research grant on education, 2020-2024 - P.I.; EIEF 2019 grant - P.I.)
- La meglio infanzia: daycare and the cognitive and non-cognitive skills of children (Fondazione Del Monte Bologna e Ravenna 2014 - P.I.; ISA Topic Grant 2013 - P.I.)
- The Policy Implications of Demographic Ageing (MIUR, FIRB 2008 –U. Bologna local unit P.I.)
She serves as a referee for numerous international journals on topics related to economics of education, labor and household economics, applied micro-econometrics.
Teaching activity
Since 2008, she has been teaching Econometrics at undergraduate level. She taught Microeconomics at the undergraduate level between 2015 and 2020 and since 2014 Causal inference at the PhD level. She taught course on quantile regression at the PhD level at the University of Bologna and CESifo and a course on microeconometrics for policy evaluation at the European Commission Directorate DG–ECFIN.
Institutional activities and academic appointments
She is the Coordinator of the PhD program in Public Governance Management and Policy at the University of Bologna since 2022. She has been member of the Board of the PhD program in Economics between 2017 and 2022, and of the Department’s Executive Board between 2008 and 2012. She is a member of the committee awarding the national qualifications in the scientific sector 13/A1
Other activities
Since 2012 she is research fellow at the Institute of Labor Economics (IZA). She joined CESifo as research affiliate in 2013, and she is research fellow at CESifo since 2019. She is CEPR research fellow since December 2020. She was senior research fellow at FBK-IRVAPP (Fondazione Bruno Kessler – Research Institute for the Evaluation of Public Policies) between 2019 and 2021 and she collaborates with FBK-IRVAPP for their schools on program evaluation in 2022. She is a member of the international expert network on the evaluation of school reforms (part of the funded project “Efficiency and Equity in Education; Quasi-Experimental Evidence from School Reforms across German States” by L. Woessmann, J. Allmendinger and M. Heilbig)
