A Study On The Relationship Between School Scale And Students' Academic Performance In The Rural Areas Of Northwest China

Improving human capital is an important guarantee for the sustained and healthy development of China's economy.In order to optimize the allocation of educational resources and improve the quality of education,China implemented the policy of adjusting the layout of primary and secondary schools in rural areas at the beginning of the 21 st century,abolished a large number of small-scale schools and made educational resources more centralized.After years of merger and adjustment,the number of primary and secondary schools in China has been declining.Data from the Ministry of Education shows that from 2000 to 2010,the number of primary schools in rural areas in China has decreased from 550,000 to 260,000.In addition,with the acceleration of urbanization,the distribution of rural schools is becoming more and more sparse,and small-scale schools are becoming fewer and fewer.The most important impact of the policy of adjustment of the layout of rural primary and secondary schools is to increase the average size of schools in rural areas.Schools scale effect has begun to attract scholars' attention.Throughout the relevant studies on school size from domestic and foreign scholars,there is no definite conclusion on how school size affects students' academic performance.Most of the existing studies are from developed countries in Europe and America,and the relevant studies in China are still slightly insufficient.Most of the studies focus on the introduction and speculative analysis of foreign studies.Several empirical studies are mostly based on schools in urban areas,and few studies are based on schools in rural areas to explore the relationship between school size and students'academic performance.The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between school size and students' academic performance in rural areas of Northwest China,and to provide reference for practitioners of education management in rural areas to establish a reasonable school size.In this study,7777 students from 106 township primary schools in 1 1 counties of A Province and 9810 students from 1 17 township primary schools in 7 counties of B Province were selected.A total of 17587 students from 223 township primary schools were selected as sample of this research.The questionnaire of students,teachers,schools and mathematical standardization tests were used as measuring tools to conduct this research.In the sample,the school scale is divided into small scale,medium scale and large scale in this research.Firstly,this study describes the current situation of school size and students' academic performance in rural areas of China.Secondly,this study estimates the correlation between school size and students'academic performance in rural areas by using the ordinary least squares method.Finally,this study analyses whether the relationship between school size and students' academic performance exists heterogeneity in different gender,boarding and non-boarding students and students with different family assets.The results of this study are as follows:(1)The average school size in rural areas of A and B province is 434.The middle-sized schools with a school size of 270 to 810 are the largest,accounting for 51.12%of the total sample schools;the small-scale schools with a scale of less than or equal to 270 are the middle,accounting for 39.91%of the total sample schools;the large-scale schools with a scale of more than 810 are the smallest,accounting for 8.97%of the total sample schools.(2)After controlling students' characteristics and family background,teachers'characteristics and school characteristics,the school size of rural primary schools in Northwest China has a significant positive correlation with students' academic performance,that is,students' academic performance increases with the increase of school size.However,the growth rate varies greatly among large,medium and small-scale schools,especially in small-scale schools.(3)After controlling students' characteristics and family backgrounds,teachers'characteristics and school characteristics,the positive correlation between school size and students' academic performance in rural areas of China is different among students of different genders.With the increase of school size,male students' academic performance will be worse than female students'.The policy of adjusting the layout of primary and secondary schools in rural areas in China mainly abolishes small-scale schools in rural areas.Since its implementation,there have been many disputes.In September 2012,the General Office of the State Council promulgated "Opinions on Regulating the Layout of Rural Compulsory Education Schools" to adjust the problems in the implementation of the previous school layout adjustment policy,requiring all localities to "strictly standardize the procedures and actions of school merger".The results of this study show that,at least from the perspective of improving the quality of teaching,school merger policy has played a positive role.