Повезаност културног капитала и опремљености школе са постигнућем ученика

Abstract

The starting point of this paper is the conception that academic achievement, education aspirations, and life chances of students are determinated by cultural capital of a family, but also the attitude that school equipment represents a significant achievement factor, especially in the modern environment where technological achievement is applied in educational practice. Relying on the existing knowledge, we tried to examine the relationship between the cultural capital of a student and their achievement in mathematics and science on the TIMSS 2015 test, as well as the equipment of a school a student attends and the TIMSS 2015 testing score. Besides that, we wanted to clarify whether good school equipment can diminish the importance of cultural capital, taking into consideration their achievement on the above-mentioned testing. In order to answer all those questions, the collected data based on the questionnaire done by 160 principals, and 4036 parents of the tested students, covered by TIMSS 2015, was used. Two composite indexes were formed: a cultural capital index (education of both parents/tutors, cultural practices of parents and children, home equipment – cultural consumption) and school equipment index (the principal’s estimates about the lack of teaching equipment and “objective” indicators of how a school is equipped). The results showed that there was a significant positive correlation between the cultural capital of a family and student achievement in mathematics and science. A very weak connection between school equipment and student achievement in mathematics and science tests was found. The research showed that the influence of cultural capital on student achievement was not diminished by school equipment, which means that low cultural capital cannot be compensated by school equipment. Decision-makers in education should invest more in resources and in developing teacher competencies for the use of those resources. Teachers should review their own teaching practices to find out to what extent they are suitable for students from different cultural milieus, or in other words - how they affect students’ ability to make progress.