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Parental qualification
Students were asked to indicate their parents’ highest level of education against a list of nationally appropriate educational levels to ensure local relevance. Each of these levels was also mapped to International Standard Classification Levels (ISCED 2011) so that consistent comparisons across countries could be made.
Highest levels of parental education
As seen in Table STT1.3, 65% of students reported at least one of their parents’ highest levels of education was above secondary education and 45% of students had at least one parent with a university education.
University-level parental education and student performance
This information was compared with student achievement in the PILNA assessments. To simplify the analysis, parents’ highest level of education was grouped into two categories: below university level and university level. Table STT1.4 shows student performance in the PILNA domains by their parents’ highest level of education.
From Table STT1.4 we see that only two associations are present: parental education and reading achievement of year four students, and parental education and writing achievement of year six students. In both cases, differences in average student performance were small.
Year four students who have a parent with a university education tended to score higher in reading than year four students who did not have a parent with a university education.
Year six students who have a parent with a university education tended to score higher in writing than year six students who did not have a parent with a university education.
What does this mean?
In Fiji, associations between parental education and performance were found in only two out of the six comparisons. At the regional level, associations were found for most comparisons in this area.
No trend can be identified in Fiji, due to the associations that were found being in different subject areas and year levels. Fiji may wish to investigate this area further, given the clear regional trend that suggests higher levels of parental education may be associated with higher performance and that students belonging to families with less education may be at a disadvantage.
