Computer science skills across China, India, Russia, and the United States

Prashant Loyalka; Ou Lydia Liu; Guirong Li; Igor Chirikov; Elena Kardanova; Lin Gu; Guangming Ling; Ningning Yu; Fei Guo; Liping Ma; Shangfeng Hu; Angela Sun Johnson; Ashutosh Bhuradia; Saurabh Khanna; Isak Froumin; Jinghuan Shi; Pradeep Kumar Choudhury; Tara Beteille; Francisco Marmolejo; Namrata Tognatta

doi:10.1073/pnas.1814646116

Computer science skills across China, India, Russia, and the United States

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2019 Apr 2;116(14):6732-6736. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1814646116. Epub 2019 Mar 18.

Authors

Prashant Loyalka^{1

2}, Ou Lydia Liu³, Guirong Li⁴, Igor Chirikov^{5

6}, Elena Kardanova⁵, Lin Gu³, Guangming Ling³, Ningning Yu⁷, Fei Guo⁸, Liping Ma⁹, Shangfeng Hu¹⁰, Angela Sun Johnson¹¹, Ashutosh Bhuradia², Saurabh Khanna², Isak Froumin⁵, Jinghuan Shi⁸, Pradeep Kumar Choudhury¹², Tara Beteille¹³, Francisco Marmolejo¹³, Namrata Tognatta¹³

Affiliations

¹ Graduate School of Education, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305; loyalka@stanford.edu.
² Rural Education Action Program, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305.
³ Educational Testing Service, Princeton, NJ 08541.
⁴ International Center for Action Research on Education, School of Education Henan University, 475001 Henan, China.
⁵ Institute of Education, National Research University Higher School of Economics, 101000 Moscow, Russia.
⁶ Center for Studies in Higher Education, Goldman School of Policy, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720.
⁷ Institute of Higher Education Research, University of Jinan, 250022 Jinan, Shandong, China.
⁸ Institute of Education, Tsinghua University, 100084 Beijing, China.
⁹ Graduate School of Education, Peking University, 100871 Beijing, China.
¹⁰ Sichuan Normal University, 610072 Sichuan, China.
¹¹ Graduate School of Education, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305.
¹² Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, 110067 Delhi, India.
¹³ World Bank, Washington, DC 20433.

Abstract

We assess and compare computer science skills among final-year computer science undergraduates (seniors) in four major economic and political powers that produce approximately half of the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics graduates in the world. We find that seniors in the United States substantially outperform seniors in China, India, and Russia by 0.76-0.88 SDs and score comparably with seniors in elite institutions in these countries. Seniors in elite institutions in the United States further outperform seniors in elite institutions in China, India, and Russia by ∼0.85 SDs. The skills advantage of the United States is not because it has a large proportion of high-scoring international students. Finally, males score consistently but only moderately higher (0.16-0.41 SDs) than females within all four countries.

Keywords: assessments; computer science; elite universities; gender; higher education.

Publication types

Comparative Study
Multicenter Study
Randomized Controlled Trial
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Academic Performance*
Adolescent
Adult
China
Female
Humans
India
Informatics / education*
Male
Russia
Sex Factors
Test Taking Skills*
United States