6533b821fe1ef96bd127b9cc
RESEARCH PRODUCT
School grading and institutional contexts
Salvatore ModicaValentino DardanoniAline Pennisisubject
Economics and EconometricsComparabilityMathematics educationSettore SECS-P/02 Politica EconomicaAcademic achievementGrades-vs-Competence Schools’ Heterogeneity External Exams PISA 2003.Settore SECS-P/01 - Economia PoliticaGrading (education)PsychologyCompetence (human resources)EducationValuation (finance)description
We study how the relationship between students' cognitive ability and their school grades depends on institutional contexts. In a simple abstract model, we show that unless competence standards are set at above-school level or the variation of competence across schools is low, students' competence valuation will be heterogeneous, with weaker schools inflating grades or flattening their dependence on competence, therefore reducing the information content and comparability of school grades. Using data from the OECD-PISA 2003 Survey, the model is applied to a sample of four countries, namely Australia, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands. We find that in Australia, schools' heterogeneity does not affect grading practices; in the other countries, grades are inflated in weaker schools, uniformly in Germany and the Netherlands, to a larger extent for weaker students in Italy.
| year | journal | country | edition | language |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2011-12-01 | Education Economics |