The effective schools: a multilevel study of explanatory factors of the school performance in the area of mathematics

This paper presents a study is classified in the classical school effectiveness research agenda that begins with Coleman Report (1966) forty years ago. Based on research literature, Spanish or American, an explanatory student achievement model has been built. It includes variables related to students, schools, teachers and student family. Among them we also include economical predictors, as amount of money devoted to education. In order to do this survey we use multilevel modeling, since this analysis allows differentiate hierarchical data structure, developing models for each data level (Draper, 1995). This analysis has been doing with PISA 2003 data base. Main results show a comprehensive explanatory achievement model that includes significant predictors as family resources, individual student features, school resources, educational context, school climate and economical investment.