Will the last be first and the first last? The role of classroom registers in cognitive skill acquisition

PLoS One. 2018 May 29;13(5):e0197746. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0197746. eCollection 2018.

Abstract

The paper estimates the effect of students' position in the classroom register on their academic performance. We use a unique dataset from Poland which contains information on the academic outcomes of students in the humanities, science and mathematics lower secondary school exams as well as the position students occupy in their classroom register. We find that students whose names are recorded near the end of the class list have lower performance than those students whose names are recorded near the beginning of the list. The effect appears to be larger for performance in the humanities exam, and for low-achieving boys who attend large classes.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Academic Performance*
  • Achievement*
  • Cohort Studies
  • Female
  • Humanities
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Mathematics
  • Poland
  • Science
  • Students / psychology*

Grants and funding

The collection of the data for this article was supported by a grant from the CERGE-EI Foundation under the Global Development Network program (RRC11_063). All opinions expressed are those of the authors and have not been endorsed by either CERGE-EI or the GDN.