Recent research has documented the academic disadvantage of low social class students, whose performance is impaired by competitive educational practices. Across 2 experiments, we examined whether the pursuit of performance-approach goals (aiming to outperform others) favors the emergence of this achievement gap. We first manipulated low versus…

The aim of this report is threefold. Its first section provides an overall sketch of the situation across Europe and the underlying mechanisms for the differences in European countries. The second section focuses on the heterogeneities within each country. It examines the disparities among students in order to understand which of those correlate…

This paper uses data mining from a French project management MOOC to study learners' performance (i.e., grades and persistence) based on a series of variables: age, educational background, socio-professional status, geographical area, gender, self- versus mandatory-enrollment, and learning intentions. Unlike most studies in this area, we focus on…

Between 2015 and 2016 we conducted computer based tests with 177 French migrant students enrolled in primary, middle and high schools, to evaluate their mathematical abilities and their levels of literacy. With 26 of this group, we supplemented data from their results with interviews and exercises on paper. By comparing their scores to those of…

The effect of composition may be strong in systems where students are systematically sorted based on their socio-economic background. This paper aims to model the differential effect of class composition on pupils' achievement in Belgium (French-speaking Community), France, Spain and Portugal. Multilevel models are consequently tested on the…

The educational needs of migrant-background students in primary and secondary schools pose a growing challenge for policymakers and educators around the world. Some national, regional, and local governments have well-designed systems of support for such students, while others are just beginning to establish targeted policies and practices to meet…

In this paper, we study the impact of parental human capital background on ethnic educational gaps between second-generation immigrants using a large data set conducted in France in 2003. Estimates from censored random effect ordered Probit regressions show that the skills of immigrants explain in the most part, the ethnic educational gap between…