International Comparisons: PISA, TIMSS & Co

Students in some countries perform much better on international achievement tests than students in other countries. Is this all due to socioeconomic and cultural differences, or do school systems make a difference? My research based on the micro data of international student tests such as PISA and TIMSS suggests that school systems are indeed very important. In particular, the institutional structures such as external exams, school autonomy, competition, and tracking play a significant role in the international differences in student achievement - and thus in the efficiency and equity of school systems. Institutional structures define whether the stakeholders in the system have incentives to focus on improving student outcomes. In contrast to institutional structures, differences in expenditures, class size, and computer facilities play hardly a role in explaining cross-country achievement differences.

Newspaper article:

Cash Alone Will not Solve the Problem of Education. The Times, 3.5.2012, p. 45

Two-pager:

Institutional Setups That Promote Student Achievement (with S. Link). EENEE Policy Brief 5/2012

A very brief overview is presented on p. 8 of:

Get an Education! Bulletin – The world's oldest banking magazine (4): 4-8, 2013 (Formez-vous!; Istruitevi!; Bildet euch!)

Non-technical contributions:

Peering over the Hedge: How Do the Neighbours Do It? CESifo Forum 13 (3): 16-19, 2012

How School Choice, Autonomy, and Accountability Impact Student Achievement: International Evidence (with M.R. West). In: C.L. Glenn, J. De Groof, and C. Stillings Candal (eds.), Balancing Freedom, Autonomy and Accountability in Education, Volume 4, Nijmegen: Wolf Legal Publishers, 275-298, 2012

Here you can learn more about my research on this topic.

I provide a non-technical overview in:

The Importance of School Systems: Evidence from International Differences in Student Achievement. Journal of Economic Perspectives 30 (3): 3-31, 2016

Why Students in Some Countries Do Better: International Evidence on the Importance of Education Policy. Education Matters 1 (2): 67-74, 2001

Presentation "The Importance of School Systems: Evidence from International Differences in Student Achievement":

My contribution to the LSE Growth Commission (starting at minute 44) covers some of these topics:

Short Video on the "International Comparative Education Policy Lab":

Slides:

Slides from my keynote lecture "The Importance of School Systems: Evidence from International Differences in Student Achievement" at a 2018 conference at the Amsterdam Centre for Inequality Studies (AMCIS)

Slides from my keynote lecture "School Systems and Student Achievement: Identification of Institutional effects from International tests" at the 2013 conference of the Italian Association of Labour Economists

Additional material is available in German.