Understanding the Ecology of Student Performance in Large-Scale Assessment

• In Event: Roundtable Session 10
  In Roundtable Session: Exploring the Implications of Varying Interpretations of Large-Scale Reform Strategies

Abstract

This study is trying to illustrate how to understand the variation of student performance in large-scale assessment from an ecological model point of view (Zumbo et al., in press). A large dataset of 15-year-olds in Shanghai-China and the US, obtained from Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2009, was re-analyzed using multivariate multilevel models. Results show that student characteristics (i.e. sex and grade level), teacher and school context (i.e. school type, student-teacher ratio, proportion of certified teacher, school responsibility for curriculum and assessment), family socioeconomic status and national differences help explain the differences in student performance. From these findings, we highlight the complexity of factors associated with student performance and the necessity to understand it from a more systematic framework.

Authors

• Yue (Michelle) Chen, The University of British Columbia

• Bruno D. Zumbo, The University of British Columbia