The Achievement Gap between Schools and Relationship between Achievement and Socioeconomic Status in Turkey

Abstract

Nowadays, the performances of education systems are monitored through national and international large-scale studies. In these studies, besides the academic performance of the countries, their status regarding equality in education is also considered. In large-scale studies the relationship between the socioeconomic status and academic achievement and the achievement gap between schools are emphasized. The achievement gap between schools is considered a chronic problem of Turkey, and socioeconomic differences are also considered to be one of the elements of this problem. In this study, the achievement gap between schools and the relationship between socioeconomic status and academic achievement in Turkey were examined through data regarding the last three cycles of TIMSS. For this purpose, multilevel regression analysis was used. The findings showed that although the mean score of Turkey increased between the 2011 and 2019 cycles, the relationship between socioeconomic characteristics and achievement remained at a similar level, with a partial decrease in 2019. These results show that despite the significant increase in Turkey's TIMSS performance in the last cycles, the share of socioeconomic levels on this performance does not increase simultaneously. Another result showed that the achievement gap between schools increased in the last cycle at both grades. Although the relationship between socioeconomic status and achievement does not increase, the widening of the achievement gap between schools may indicate that within-school factors might have stronger relations with achievement. Results revealed that the performance of Turkey in TIMSS increased significantly at 8th grade, and the relationship between socioeconomic status and achievement decreased partially; however, the alleviation of the achievement gap between schools remained a development area for Turkey. Although the relationship between socioeconomic status and academic achievement decreased in the 2019 cycle, the current socioeconomic status role increased the importance of compensating students' socioeconomic disadvantages through educational support programs.

Keywords

• achievement gap
• socioeconomic status
• equality in education
• TIMSS
• academic achievement

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