Uspješnost predviđanja obrazovnih postignuća učenika osnovnih škola Republike Hrvatske

The aim of this study was to examine to what extent school achievement at the end of primary schooling could be determined by certain student characteristics and characteristics of their environment, teachers, teaching process, school and school principal. The sample included 44,801 students from 842 regular primary schools. School achievement was measured by objective exams in Croatian, English, Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Geography and History and explored for each subject separately. Multiple regression analyses were conducted with student results on the exams as criterion variables and student characteristics, teacher and teaching process characteristics, and school and principal characteristics as predictors. The results of multiple regression analyses showed that 5.3% to 15.9% variance of knowledge in different subjects could be accounted for by student characteristics, while teacher and teaching process characteristics explained 0.2% to 1.1%, and school and principal characteristics 0.2% to 0.8% of additional variance. At the student level significant predictors were gender, parents’ education and family structure. At the teacher level significant predictors were teacher’s gender, qualification and continuity of teaching the same students, while significant predictors at the school level were school size and founder, personnel competence and principal’s experience. The problem of measurement and conceptualization of academic achievements is discussed in the context of the obtained results.