Extracurricular activities and educational ouctomes: evidence from high-performing schools in St Petersburg, Russia

This article is based on a survey carried out among 2,428 ninth-graders from 64 high-performing schools in St. Petersburg, Russia. In the study, we examine the relationships between socioeconomic background, extracurricular participation, and educational outcomes. The findings demonstrate high levels of participation in out-of-school, compared to school-based, extracurricular activities. Extracurricular participation was also shown to be associated with better grades and, to some extent, with higher levels of university aspirations. The relatively small estimate sizes indicate, however, that extracurricular participation is not a major factor in differences in educational outcomes. Nevertheless, since participation was higher among socioeconomically more advantaged students, and grades and/or levels of university aspirations were higher among those who participated, we argue that extracurricular participation should be understood as part of social reproduction in Russia.