Author:

Keywords:

consistency, school effectiveness, mathematics tests, large-scale assessments

Abstract:

Consistency and stability have become increasingly important research topics within the field of educational effectiveness (Sammons, 1996). Consistency refers to the correlation between school effects on various topics (Goldstein et al., 1993), while stability refers to the correlation between school effects at different moments in time (Doolaard, 2002, Thomas, Sammons, Mortimore & Smees, 1997). In the present paper, the consistency of school effects for different subfields of mathematics is investigated in the vocational track in secondary education in Flanders (Belgium). An exploratory factor analysis was performed on both raw school residuals and school residuals after correction for students’ background characteristics. Three factors emerged which referred to school differences in (a) measurement and geometry, (b) calculus and (c) applied or functional mathematics. Regression of the factor scores on school characteristics showed a few significant relationships with the type of school and the educational authority.