The Learning Environment and the Organisation of Schooling

Chapter 4 showed the considerable impact that socio-economic background can have on student performance and, by implication, on the distribution of educational opportunities. At the same time, many of the factors of socioeconomic disadvantage are not directly amenable to education policy, at least not in the short term. For example, the educational attainment of parents can only gradually improve, and average family wealth depends on the longterm economic development of a country as well as on the development of a culture which promotes individual savings. The importance of socio-economic disadvantage, and the realisation that aspects of such disadvantage only change over extended periods of time, give rise to a vital question for policy makers: what can schools and school policies do to raise performance and promote equity? Building on the results from PISA 2000, which suggested that students and schools perform better in a climate characterised by high expectations, the readiness of students to invest effort, the enjoyment of learning, a positive disciplinary climate and good teacher-student relations, this chapter examines policy levers and school-level characteristics that are often thought to be conducive to raising ...