Abstract
This paper investigates student social relationships in secondary schools and its relationship with student achievement in Norway and Romania. Using data from national youth surveys (“Young in Norway 2010” for Norway and “School Success Profile Survey 2010” for Romania), we explore the concept and measurement of social capital in the school context by applying factor analysis. The paper also tests an analytical model that links student home background, student social capital and student academic achievement, using a structural equation modelling technique (LISREL). Control variables in the analysis are student gender and ethnicity. Testing the analytical model with the two datasets respectively, the results show that student social capital, generated from student social relations with parents, teachers and peers, has a significant influence on student achievement in both countries. Analysis also confirms differences between the two countries in respect to the effect of home background variables and social capital on achievement.
Highlights
On the surface, Norway and Romania appear as two contrasting European countries: the former is a relatively young country, independent since 1905, with a political system representative of advanced Western democracy, while the later has a long history, characterized in the recent past by several decades of communist rule
Home human and economic capital has a very strong positive and direct effect on student achievement in both cases, but its effect on social capital differs substantially between the two societies. While this home asset has an effect on every social relation of the Norwegian child, it exerts a strong effect only on the peer relation of the child in Romania which gives little in return to student achievement
A good childparent relationship makes more contributions to the academic achievement of the Romanian child than to that of the Norwegian child. All these reflections help us move towards a better understanding of school success, providing evidence on the significance of social relationships, gender and having an immigrant background. Putting these results into a broader theoretical context, these findings appear to support Coleman’s social capital theory only in the Norwegian schools as home capital in Romania seems to invest in “wrong” social capital which offers relatively little in return to contribute to achievement, highlighting the importance of national diversity in appreciating the importance of social capital in our educational context
Summary
Norway and Romania appear as two contrasting European countries: the former is a relatively young country, independent since 1905, with a political system representative of advanced Western democracy, while the later has a long history, characterized in the recent past by several decades of communist rule. According to UNESCO (2012), compulsory education in both countries lasts for a period of 10 years, from the age of 6 until 16, and gross enrolment rate is high: 99% in Norway and 96% in Romania; transition rate from primary to secondary is 100% in Norway and 98.5% in Romania; and both countries have achieved gender parity in compulsory education, with women the majority students at tertiary education level in both these countries (see Figure 1). The two countries differ in terms of the quality of education; for example, 6% of Norwegian students were of the lowest proficiency on PISA mathematics in 2009 while for Romania the equivalent figure is 20% (UNESCO, 2012)
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