Does the Teacher Beat the Test? The Value of the Teacher’s Assessment in Predicting Student Ability

Eva Feron (), Trudie Schils and Bas ter Weel ()
Additional contact information
Eva Feron: Maastricht University
Bas ter Weel: Maastricht University

De Economist, 2016, vol. 164, issue 4, No 3, 418 pages

Abstract: Abstract This research investigates to what extent the subjective teacher’s assessment of children’s ability predicts children’s outcomes in the transition from primary to secondary school in terms of initial track allocation, track switching in the first three years of secondary education and subsequent test scores. We apply micro-data from the Netherlands about cognitive test scores and teacher’s assessment in primary schools and about track placement, track switching and test scores in secondary schools. Our estimates suggest that the subjective teacher’s assessment is about twice as important as the primary school cognitive test scores for initial track placement in secondary school. In addition, the teacher’s assessment is more predictive of track allocation in 9th grade compared to cognitive test scores. Next, children who switch tracks are more likely to be placed in tracks based on test scores. Also, test scores in 9th grade are predicted by the subjective teacher’s assessment, not by test scores in 6th grade.

Keywords: Education; Assessment measures; Tracking (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10645-016-9278-z Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:decono:v:164:y:2016:i:4:d:10.1007_s10645-016-9278-z

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... cs/journal/10645/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s10645-016-9278-z

Access Statistics for this article

De Economist is currently edited by Rob Alessie, Bas ter Weel, Casper van Ewijk, Jan C. van Ours and Frank de Jong

More articles in De Economist from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().