Background

Evaluations of effectiveness of educational reforms are often based on the level of improvement in student performance from one cycle of a particular assessment to the next. However, improvements in overall performance do not necessarily translate to improved equality. Indeed, improvements that favour certain subgroups of students can exacerbate educational performance gaps and thus, inequality. This research examines changes in equality of mathematics achievement and subgroup performance differences in Irish primary school students over time. Ireland constitutes an interesting case study due to the introduction of a new National Literacy and Numeracy Strategy in 2011, the initial implementation of which has been linked to significant improvements in student mathematics performance. This paper aims to investigate whether these improvements have been accompanied by improvements in equality.

Methods

Using data from the Irish National Assessments of Mathematics and English Reading (NAMER) and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) from the period before and after the introduction of the Strategy, the study examines (i) deviations in student scores, (ii) variability in achievement at student and school levels and (iii) performance gaps based on demographic and socioeconomic factors over time. Bivariate analyses and multilevel regression models were used to identify student- and school-level variables related to mathematics performance.

Results

The results showed a decrease in variability in students’ mathematics performance after the introduction of the Strategy; this decrease was statistically significant only for TIMSS. Additionally, there was a considerable decrease in variance in mathematics performance attributed to between-school differences over time. These findings constitute evidence of increased equality as performance differences between students and schools tended to shrink. Regarding performance gaps and variance in mathematics performance explained by background characteristics, this study provided mixed results. In NAMER, subsequent to the introduction of the Strategy, the performance gaps and variance in mathematics achievement explained by selected demographic and socioeconomic characteristics decreased considerably. However, this was not the case for TIMSS.

Conclusions

The evidence provided by this study suggests that Ireland has made reasonable progress in addressing inequality. However, there is room for improvement, as a significant proportion of the variance in student mathematics performance is still explained by demographic and socioeconomic characteristics.

中文翻译：

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检查教育不平等：在改进数学表现的背景下对爱尔兰初等国家和国际评估的见解

背景

对教育改革有效性的评估通常基于从一个特定评估的一个周期到下一个评估周期的学生表现的提高水平。但是，总体绩效的提高并不一定意味着平等性的提高。确实，有利于某些学生群体的进步会加剧教育成绩差距，从而加剧不平等。这项研究研究了随时间推移爱尔兰小学生数学成绩平等程度和小组表现差异的变化。爱尔兰是一个有趣的案例研究，因为2011年引入了新的《国家扫盲与算术战略》，该战略的最初实施与学生数学成绩的显着提高相关。

方法

利用该策略实施前后的爱尔兰国家数学和英语阅读国家评估（NAMER）数据以及国际数学和科学研究的趋势（TIMSS），该研究检查了（i）学生分数的偏差， （ii）学生和学校水平上的成就差异，以及（iii）基于人口和社会经济因素随时间变化的成绩差距。使用双变量分析和多级回归模型来确定与数学成绩相关的学生和学校水平的变量。

结果

结果表明，采用该策略后，学生数学成绩的变异性有所降低；这种减少仅对TIMSS具有统计学意义。此外，随着时间的流逝，归因于学校之间的差异，数学成绩的差异也大大减少了。这些发现表明，随着学生和学校之间的表现差异趋于缩小，平等程度有所提高。关于由背景特征解释的数学成绩中的成绩差距和方差，本研究提供了混合的结果。在NAMER中，在引入该策略之后，由选定的人口和社会经济特征所解释的数学成绩的成绩差距和方差大大减少了。但是，TIMSS并非如此。

结论

这项研究提供的证据表明，爱尔兰在解决不平等方面取得了合理的进展。但是，仍有改进的空间，因为学生数学成绩的很大一部分差异仍由人口统计学和社会经济特征来解释。