Geography and its geography : A quantitative study on Swedish primary school students results and its causes

This paper is focused on finding answers to questions regarding factors that affect pupil’s ability to reach different levels of success in geography. The indicators that make up measures for success are pupils results on Sweden’s national testing in year nine and grades for the same year in the subject of geography. Questions to be answered in the essay regard observable differences between different groups of pupils and possible explanations of these and if geographic prerequisites somehow correlate with pupil results. The research presented in this paper has been committed by international as well as Swedish researchers and includes research from Swedish official bodies. The presented previous research divides into three categories which respectively involves research on pupils, research on teachers and research on societal influences on school results. As this paper studies populations in a wider context than that of the classroom, research regarding pupils and teachers will mainly act as background knowledge to nuance any conclusions made about the statistical material. This paper uses the method of causal filtration, wherein previous research act as possible explanations to identified differences between groups. This entails that research regarding societal factors, such as demographic ones, will help guide causal explanations to identified differences in the source material. When no answers remain to be found in identified differences causal filtration aims to find other possible explanations or at least correlations. Studying publicly available statistics regarding pupils results on national testing and grades as well as demographic and economic realities for different schools enables a breakdown of the results into different groups of pupils, which enables identification of differences in results. The groups of pupils to be studied are pupils in charter schools vis-à-vis pupils in public schools, pupils in different types of municipalities, who are arranged according to size variation and finally regional differences in between schools. The indicators used are the pupil’s average numerical results on the national tests and grades as well as the percentage of pupils that manages passing grades and passing levels on the national tests. When differences are identified, they will get analysed with the causal filtration model, wherein previous research helps to guide conclusions. The results show that girls achieve better results than boys, that pupils in charter schools achieve better results than pupils in public schools, that pupils in the Stockholm region achieve better results than pupils in the Västra Götaland region or the Skåne region and that pupils in mid-sized municipalities achieve better results than pupils in small municipalities and big city municipalities. The reasons for the differences are partially demographic in nature, but also points to differences in attitudes towards schoolwork between boys and girls. As far as the results of differences between different types of municipalities go, it can be shown that geographical prerequisites, apart from demographic ones, correlate with the observed differences in results, though causal links remain elusive. The results raise new questions and opens for further research on the influence of geography on school results, as well as the impact that choices in test design may have for the equivalency on a national level of the Swedish national tests. Key words: demography, grades, geography, national tests