Determinants of Academic Achievement of Middle Schoolers in Turkey

(ProQuest: . denotes formulae omitted.)While education provides individuals an opportunity for cognitive, social and emotional development, it maintains and creates social stratification (Montt, 2011). Socioeconomic factors, along with school- and community-related factors, cause inequalities in education. For instance, gender (being female) and wealth (being poor) are major obstacles to school enrollment and achievement (Filmer, 2005; Nguyen, 2006). In some countries, females still do not have the same opportunities as males. Females do not have equal access to education and have lower academic achievement than their male peers (Nguyen, 2006). The literature has pointed to socioeconomic-related educational inequalities in underdeveloped (Grimm, 2011) and developing countries (Martins & Veiga, 2010). Students who grow up in families of low socioeconomic status (SES), specifically, those whose parents have low levels of education, low incomes, or low-prestige occupations, generally show slower cognitive development than students whose parents have high SES (Gamboa & Waltenberg, 2012; Hertzman, 1994; Hertzman & Weins, 1996). This can be explained with Bourdieu's cultural capital reproduction theory (1986), which holds that "socioeconomic inequalities in education persist because highly educated parents give their children a better understanding of the dominant culture and an ability to act within it" (p. 1017, as cited in Martins & Vegia, 2010). Identifying the sources of inequalities in educational attainment and achievement and, reducing their effects are major concerns of educational researchers and policymakers worldwide.School variables such as school culture, resources (e.g., books, teacher-student ratio), and the socioeconomic composition of a school can create learning situation that exacerbate imbalances in student achievement across schools (Baker, Goesling, & Letendre, 2002; Thrupp, Lauder, & Rabinson, 2002). The Equality of Educational Opportunity Study (Coleman et al., 1966), also known as the Coleman Study, surprised many researchers and policymakers, not only in the United States but throughout the world; it showed that, rather than the school itself, it was the socioeconomic and ethnic background of families that constituted the source of variation in achievement. Since then, much research has been conducted to verify whether these findings hold true in other countries as well. Some studies conclude that the impact of schools on student achievement is small in wealthy countries but relatively strong in poorer countries (Buchmann, 2002; Fuller & Clarke, 1994; Heyneman & Loxley, 1983). Other findings, however, are consistent with those of the Coleman Study (Baker et al., 2002). Beyond the acknowledged effect of family factors on school participation, the influence of school- and community-related factors on student achievement remains essentially unexplored. Binder (1999) and numerous other researchers have drawn attention to this gap in the literature. Few studies have been conducted in Turkey to examine school and family effects on school outcomes such as achievement on national large-scale assessment and the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) (Alacaci & Erbac, 2010; Dincer & Uysal, 2010; Guncer & Kose, 1993; Tomul & Savacci, 2010). Existing Turkish studies have their own methodological limitations. For instance, they used data collected by the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), which raises concerns about the validity of test results, sample coverage and representativeness (Ferreira & Gignoux, 2011). Pisa Sampling coverage rate is below 50% and no information about non-participant students is available (Carvalho, Gamboa, & Waltenberg, 2012). The purpose of this study is to explore student and school factors that contribute to inequalities in seventh- and eighth-grade student achievement in the Turkish context by using national achievement test scores. …