Using Multilevel Analysis to Assess School Effectiveness: A Study of Dutch Secondary Schools

This paper is divided into three parts to show separate but related developments in the new generation of school effectiveness research. The first part presents a short historical overview which traces the change from a largely individualistic research approach to one that is more holistic. We explore a question that has had prominence in the last decades of educational research: Do schools make a difference? and if they do, what makes them effective? We examine two competing theories that offer different explanations for school effects. These two theories are also the basis of a discussion about the merits of private versus public education in the United States. The second part of this paper reviews the accompanying search for an appropriate analysis model. The last part describes a new way of analyzing hierarchically nested data by using a large data set that represents students from the different forms of secondary education that exist today in the Netherlands. The effects of selection policies In the Dutch educational system are clearly Indicated through use of a statistical tool that is especially suited for the analysis of multilevel data. We compare these results with those found in studies that examine school systems in the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States of America (USA) and generalize our findings. We conclude that the selection policies of schools indeed have consequences for student achievement.