The Widening Achievement Gap in Korea: Evidence from PISA 2000-2015

Abstract

The growing concerns with regard to whether education inequality will continue to increase in Korea are empirically examined in this research. Of several ways of defining and conceptualizing education inequality, this dissertation focuses on the magnitude of relationship between the family socioeconomic status and students academic achievement. To examine the trends of achievement gap, the international education survey PISA (Program for International Student Assessment) database were analyzed from 2000 to 2015. The PISA data revealed that the achievement gap caused by socioeconomic background has widened during the past fifteen years. The performances of socioeconomically disadvantaged students and low-performers have been decreased, while the advantaged students and high-performers have been benefited from their background, which were examined with the multidimensional variable of students socioeconomic status. The alternative analysis employing book possessions as a proxy variable for students background also presents the same trends that the students at the bottom of the distribution shows the declining results, leading to the expanding gap. Moreover, variance among schools has been increased with within-school heterogeneity since 2000. The association between the average of schools socioeconomic status and the mean scores of school performances also has been substantially strengthened. Considered that the target population in this analysis attends high school, it may be directly influenced of the emergence of new type high schools such as independent private high school. However, the questions still remains that the reason why the between-school difference has been decreased as opposed to the hypothesis. The findings imply that the recent reforms for differentiated education may have led to some undesirable consequences that disadvantaged students have performed worse under the new system, contrary to their intended goals. In order to close the achievement gap, it is necessary that the new approach to help the underprivileged students experience positively in schools. The educational activities that may lack to socioeconomically disadvantaged students should be supplemented in a diverse aspects as possible as earlier stages of schooling.