School choice and educational attitudes: Spatially uneven neoliberalization in Sweden

Figures & data

Table 1. School location area type, frequency and percentage

No.	School location area type	Frequency	%
1	Urban, densely populated	428	12.6
2	Suburban, on fringe or outskirts of urban area	905	26.6
3	Medium-size city or large town	868	25.5
4	Small town or village	825	24.2
5	Remote rural	377	11.1
Totals		3403	100.0

Source: Data files with test results and survey results for the Swedish population in TIMSS 2015, Grade 4 and Grade 8 (Datafiler med provresultat och enkätsvar för den svenska populationen i Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2015 årskurs 4, och årskurs 8), (Dnr 75-2013:69). The dataset can be accessed upon application to Skolverket.

Table 2. The study variables

Variable	Valid N	Coding	Proportion coded 1	Individuals coded 1
Sex of pupils: female	3403	0/1	.48
Active school choice of non-closest-to-home school	3403	0/1	.30	1031
At least one parent with tertiary education or higher	3403	0/1	.50	1705
Both parents born outside Sweden	3403	0/1	.16	557
European socio-economic classification (three-class version of ESeC)*	3403	0/1/2/3
ASBM01B Disagree greatly with the statement: ‘I wish I did not have to study mathematics’	3403	0/1	.57	1924
ASBM01D Agree greatly with the statement ‘I learn many interesting things in mathematics’	3403	0/1	.45	1545
ASBS04B Disagree greatly with the statement ‘I wish I did not have to study science’	3403	0/1	.57	1951
ASBS04D Agree greatly with the statement ‘I learn many interesting things in science’	3403	0/1	.56	1896
Parents expected their child to complete postgraduate education (master’s or doctoral) (1: Finish lower secondary; 2: Finish upper secondary; 3: Finish post-secondary, non-tertiary; 4: Finish short-cycle tertiary; 5: Finish undergraduate or equivalent; 6: Finish postgraduate)**	3251**	0/1	.22	708
Agree greatly with the statement ‘I am proud to go to this school’ (ASGB11F***)	3380	0/1	.63	2115
Valid N (listwise)	3229

Source: Data files with test results and survey results for the Swedish population in TIMSS 2015, Grade 4 and Grade 8 (Datafiler med provresultat och enkätsvar för den svenska populationen i Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2015 årskurs 4, och årskurs 8), (Dnr 75-2013:69). The dataset can be accessed upon application to Skolverket.

Notes: *See Harrison & Rose (2006); **The N for the variable is lower than the N for the other variables in Table 2 because it is based on the parental survey; ***The item ID in The item ID in the TIMMS 2015 International Database (TIMSS & PIRLS International Study Center n.d.)

Fig. 1. Proportions of parents who answered that they had made an active school choice for their child (column widths proportional to number of responses)

Fig. 2. Cumulative percentage for the different area types; content of active school choosers per school, ranging from lowest to highest percentage of choosers per school in the area

Fig. 3. The proportion of pupils with at least one parent with tertiary education (column widths proportional to number of responses)

Fig. 4. The proportion of pupils without a Swedish-born parent (column widths proportional to number of responses)

Fig. 5. The area type and the proportion of parents with higher education who made an active school choice (column widths proportional to number of responses)

Fig. 6. The proportion of pupils who did not want to drop mathematics (column widths proportional to number of responses)

Fig. 7. The area type and the proportion of pupils who agreed strongly with the statement ‘I am proud to go to this school’ (column widths proportional to number of responses)

Table 3. The effects of parental status, location and class composition on maths results from the TIMMS 2015 survey (see footnote for source); fixed-effect models, with standard error shown in parenthesis (estimated using Macdonald’s Stata module (Macdonald 2019)); significant results (1%) shown in bold font

Item	Only location	Location and individual	Full model
Intercept	525.01 (5.33)	514.31 (5.00)	509.33 (7.16)
Individual level:
Parents with tertiary education		27.96 (3.63)	22.50 (3.03)
Foreign-born parents		-49.280 (6.66)	-29.900 (6.34)
High parental ambition		20.29 (3.71)	19.79 (3.77)
Active school choice		2.21 (3.62)	-4.24 (3.16)
Location:
Urban, densely populated	18.82 (8.91)	9.96 (8.16)	1.32 (8.52)
Suburban	-0.25 (7.05)	2.83 (5.99)	3.35 (6.52)
Medium-size city or large town	-2.85 (8.70)	-1.66 (6.60)	-0.07 (6.62)
Small town or village	-0.35 (6.99)	0.11 (6.00)	-1.97 (5.68)
Pupil composition:
Proportion with parents with tertiary education			20.70 (12.78)
Proportion with foreign-born parents			-47.93 (13.83)
Proportion with ‘high ambition’ parents			-8.67 (17.10)
Proportion with active school choosers			23.69 (9.72)
N	3251	3251	3251
Adjusted R-square	0.0097	0.1463	0.1719

Source: Data files with test results and survey results for the Swedish population in TIMSS 2015, Grade 4 and Grade 8 (Datafiler med provresultat och enkätsvar för den svenska populationen i Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2015 årskurs 4, och årskurs 8), (Dnr 75-2013:69). The dataset can be accessed upon application to Skolverket.

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