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Poverty and social benefits in socially excluded localities
Federičová, Miroslava ; Kalíšková, Klára ; Zapletalová, Lucie
This study presents a unique analysis of the living conditions of individuals and households in socially excluded localities (SELs) in terms of their income and exposure to poverty, compared to the average population. Special attention is paid to the receipt of social benefits and their effectiveness in reducing poverty. The analysis is based on unique data from living conditions in a socially excluded localities survey (SEL-SILC), conducted in 2020 by the Agency for Social Inclusion of the Czech Ministry of Regional Development, and from data from the Living Conditions Survey (EU-SILC) conducted by the Czech Statistical Office in 2020.
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Teacher turnover in Europe
Federičová, Miroslava ; Pertold, Filip
This short study summarises the findings of original empirical research on long-term trends in teachers exiting the profession in all European regions, including the Czech Republic. We find similar patterns in some respects across all countries, but there are significant regional differences. For the Czech Republic and countries in the entire Central European region, we find that, during the economic transformation from 1990-2000 more young male teachers left the teaching profession. This is likely due to more lucrative opportunities in alternative professions. The economic transformation significantly contributed to the feminization of the teaching profession.
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The outflow of high-ability students from regular schools and its long-term impact on those left behind
Federičová, Miroslava
Early tracking school systems, which stream student by ability, are considered a trigger of widening inequality in education. However, more homogenous class composition resulting from ability tracking seem to improve efficiency of teaching and learning. Literature on peer effects shows contradictory findings about these two counteracting effects. This paper contributes to the discussion of the efficacy of ability tracking by examining the effects of the outflow of high-ability students after primary education on the long-term educational outcomes and behaviour of their peers who remain in regular classes. Exploiting a 2009 school reform in Slovakia which postponed tracking by one year, we show that the outflow of high-performing peers results in a weak negative long-run effect on non-tracked student’s math scores and late arrivals at school, and more persistent negative effects on out-of-school study time.\n
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Pre-school abilities: European comparative study
Neufussová, Monika ; Münich, Daniel (advisor) ; Federičová, Miroslava (referee)
Pre-school education improves cognitive and non-cognitive skills of children, and the positive effects persist to adulthood. The literature provides rich ev- idence of beneficial effects of pre-school, some of them even causal. However, most studies come from the US, and the research lacks a comprehensive pic- ture of European countries concerning pre-school education. I contribute to the research by providing a comparison of European countries regarding pre- school attendance, pre-school skills, and test scores in fourth grade. In Section ??, I focus on the Czech Republic. The results show that more educated moth- ers are more likely to send children to pre-school. In most countries, children with stronger pre-school skills achieve higher results on standardized tests in fourth grade, which supports the idea of the existence of the Matthew effect. In the Czech Republic, pre-school attendance may increase fourth-grade test scores by 0.3 SD. The most important pre-school skill is the ability to read, which is associated with an increase in fourth-grade math achievement of 0.2 SD. The results contribute to the literature on pre-school education in Eu- rope; however, they should not be interpreted causally, as they are essentially a description of the pre-school context in Europe. 1
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Pre-school abilities: European comparative study
Neufussová, Monika ; Münich, Daniel (advisor) ; Federičová, Miroslava (referee)
Pre-school education improves cognitive and non-cognitive skills of children, and the positive effects persist to adulthood. The literature provides rich ev- idence of beneficial effects of pre-school, some of them even causal. However, most studies come from the US, and the research lacks a comprehensive pic- ture of European countries concerning pre-school education. I contribute to the research by providing a comparison of European countries regarding pre- school attendance, pre-school skills, and test scores in fourth grade. In Section ??, I focus on the Czech Republic. The results show that more educated moth- ers are more likely to send children to pre-school. In most countries, children with stronger pre-school skills achieve higher results on standardized tests in fourth grade, which supports the idea of the existence of the Matthew effect. In the Czech Republic, pre-school attendance may increase fourth-grade test scores by 0.3 SD. The most important pre-school skill is the ability to read, which is associated with an increase in fourth-grade math achievement of 0.2 SD. The results contribute to the literature on pre-school education in Eu- rope; however, they should not be interpreted causally, as they are essentially a description of the pre-school context in Europe. 1
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The Covid-19 pandemic and socio-economic inequality in education
Federičová, Miroslava ; Korbel, Václav
In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, schools have been closed since 11th March 2020 and have been obliged to switch to remote teaching. This new situation may, among other effects, further deepen the considerable existing inequalities in education, which are already higher in the Czech Republic than in most other European countries. In this study, we look at various factors that may affect how remote teaching can be related to socioeconomic educational inequalities in the Czech Republic. For the sake of clarity, we distinguish between factors relevant to schools, families, and pupils. The aim of this study is not to describe the current situation but to outline who is most at risk of losing out as a result of remote teaching and where possible measures should be targeted in order to prevent deepening inequalities in education further. In this study, we focus on primary and lower secondary schools, with an emphasis on the lower secondary years.
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International comparison of school principals: Czech administrative hell
Federičová, Miroslava
School leadership is a serious problem in the Czech Republic. In this study, we document how a number of extremes converge at the level of elementary school leadership in the Czech Republic: (i) schools have substantial autonomy, (ii) school principals labour under very large administrative burdens, (iii) the average new principal is insufficiently prepared for the role, (iv) principals’ salaries are relatively low and insufficient to attract strong candidates, and (v) there are a very large number of small schools, necessitating a large number of principals. This unhealthy combination of factors generates a significant problem for Czech schooling, of which only a narrow circle of experts has thus far been aware. For this reason, little progress has been made towards considering how problems might be solved or at least minimised.
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How school report grades affect pupils’ life decision
Federičová, Miroslava
Every year around 14 % of pupils in the fifth grade of primary school apply for places at eightyear gymnasium. More girls than boys apply for places by 53 percent, and more girls than boys are accepted by 53%. The gender imbalance in applications and places awarded is even greater at the later points of transition to gymnasium (academic track secondary schools) for its sixyear and four-year formats. This study only looks at the transition to eight-year format. Girls are on average awarded better grades on their school reports than boys who achieve identical test results. This is apparently because teachers award grades based not only on cognitive skills and knowledge but also on the pupils’ socio-emotional abilities, in which boys tend to be worse off. The criteria for admission to eight-year gymnasium are based primarily on the results of admissions and in part on the applicant’s average grade on their most recent half-yearly school report. Pupils’ decisions about whether to apply to gymnasium are primarily determined by their school report grades, in particular whether they have achieved the top grade “1”, rather than by their expectations about their admissions test results. Our analysis reveals that gender imbalance among applicants to eight-year gymnasium persists even when we compare groups of boys and girls with identical chances of admission. The imbalance is most marked in the group of pupils with borderline chances of admission. A much larger proportion of boys than of girls in this group achieved grades lower than “1” on their reports in one or both of the key subjects – mathematics and Czech language. Pupils’ and parents’ inaccurate assumptions about pupils’ cognitive skills based on their report grades can distort pupils’ further educational ambitions, lead them to make inappropriate decisions about further schooling and thus substantially influence their educational pathways, careers and life stories.\nReport grades provide particularly imperfect information about pupils’ abilities due to their extremely limited comparability: grades are awarded differently at different schools and by different teachers (whose subjective views they reflect), and the weight given to pupils’ socioemotional skills within the grade is unclear.
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Essays on Early Tracking School System
Federičová, Miroslava ; Münich, Daniel (advisor) ; Rivkin, Steven (referee) ; Falch, Torberg (referee)
Essays on the Effects of Early School Tracking Miroslava Federičová Dissertation Abstract This dissertation studies the transition process of the early-tracking school system that usually occurs at the age of 10, and focuses on its effects on student academic achievement. Moreover, as this early selection occurs at the time of changes in brain development that is different for boys and girls, all chapters also examine the topics from the perspective of gender. Chapter 1 is focused on the selection process itself and studies the role of grades in explaining the gender difference in application rates to selective schools. This selection is provided mostly according to cognitive skills that are signalled to pupils in the form of grades. Although grades play a very important role in the application process, conditional on cognitive skills, grades differ substantially between girls and boys. In this chapter, I propose the model of asymmetric signal of the probability of admission for girls and boys arising from grades. Data about transition from primary to selective schools in the Czech Republic shows that girls apply at significantly higher rates. I find that this difference also remains the same after controlling for probability of admission. Furthermore, test scores collected by an international testing...
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