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Given the expected advantages for individuals and societies, financial literacy is high on the policy agenda in many countries. This paper reports the results from a unique survey conducted on a sample of 13-16-year-old students in five European countries, aimed at measuring and comparing their level of financial literacy skills. The results indicate significant differences in the level of financial literacy across countries that are interpreted in the light of the differences in the countries' educational policies and experiences with financial education. The findings suggest that supra-national coordinated action is needed to guarantee better financial knowledge and safeguard economic stability in future crises.

The school closures owing to the 2020 COVID-19 crisis resulted in a significant disruption of education provision, leading to fears of learning losses and of an increase in educational inequality. This article evaluates the effects of school closures based on standardised tests in the last year of primary school in the Dutch-speaking Flemish region of Belgium. Using a 6-year panel, we find that students of the 2020 cohort experienced significant learning losses in three out of five tested subjects, with a decrease in school averages of mathematics scores of 0.17 standard deviations and Dutch scores (reading, writing, language) of 0.19 standard deviations as compared to previous cohorts. This finding holds when accounting for school characteristics, standardised tests in Grade 4 and school fixed effects. Given the large observed effect sizes, the effect of school closures appears to be a combination of lost learning progress and learning loss. Moreover, we observe that inequality both within schools and across schools rises by 7% for mathematics and 8% for Dutch. The learning losses are correlated with observed school characteristics, as schools with a more disadvantaged student population experience larger learning losses.

This paper reviews studies on diversity in higher education institutions and suggests empirical approaches to measure diversity. "Diversity" in this paper refers to the internal and external differences among academic programs and institutions. As the empirical literature is relatively salient about how to measure diversity in higher education, the study suggests and compares the use of the Herfindhal index, Gini coefficient, Theil entropy index and the Birnbaum (1983) measure. Applying the indices to data on Dutch higher education, the results indicate limited diversity between institutions, disciplines, and bachelor's programs. The diversity at the master's program and first year bachelor's program levels increased between 2008 and 2013.

This article discusses the teachers' role in self-directed learning (SDL) -- a central concept in adult education. We explore the use of Socratic questioning to develop critical thinking, which is the outcome of SDL in problem-based learning (PBL). In particular, we analyse 11 adult learners' reflective journals in relation to a Socratic seminar. Findings showed that adult learners value the mutual relationship between the learner and the teacher in managing the learning process. In addition, we suggest a teaching approach where Socratic questioning can facilitate students' SDL. We conclude with implications on its use as a means to initiate the learning goals of a PBL tutorial.

This article provides a meta-analysis on the effect of academic probation, student-faculty mentoring and need-based grants on various student outcomes. Using 25 (quasi-) experimental studies, we find that academic probation has a significant negative effect on retention (d = -0.17), while it does not have an effect on graduation. Student-faculty mentoring, however, has a positive significant effect on both retention (d = 0.15) and graduation (d = 0.10). Need-based grants are proven to have a positive significant effect on enrollment (d = 0.05), retention (d = 0.05) and graduation (d = 0.05). Based on the general effect sizes of each intervention, student-faculty mentoring has the largest influence on student outcomes. The latter intervention improves retention and graduation of the treatment group by, respectively, 8% and 5% compared to the control group.

This paper examines the effect of the introduction of an academic dismissal (AD) policy (i.e. an intervention, which can lead to compulsory student withdrawal) on student dropout, student graduation rates and satisfaction with the study program. Using a difference-in-differences type of estimator, we compare programs that introduced an AD policy with a control group of programs which did not employ an AD policy. The robustness of the results is tested by a propensity score matching. The outcomes suggest that the implementation of an AD policy results in a higher first-year dropout rate and a higher student graduation rate. The results also indicate that, on average, student satisfaction decreases due to the introduction of an AD policy, while student satisfaction regarding program feasibility increases when an AD policy is employed.

Higher education institutions have experienced an increase in student enrolment over the past decades. At the same time, universities increasingly attempt to attract students by offering a variety of study programmes. Using a Dutch panel data set of 1300 programmes in 50 institutions, this study investigates what explains the attractiveness of study programmes. We hypothesize that the distance of study programmes plays a major role in student decisions to attend. Based on an instrumental variables identification strategy, we demonstrate that the closest distance between similar programmes offered and competition between programmes have significant effects on the enrolment of students in higher education. The results indicate that a one-kilometer increase in the closest distance between similar programmes decreases the number of students to enrol in a programme by seven students after controlling for programme type and other characteristics.

Schools frequently increase the instructional time to improve primary school children's math and reading skills. There is, however, little evidence that math and reading skills are effectively improved by these instruction-time increases. This study evaluates "Playing for Success" (PfS), an extended school day program for underachieving pupils that uses the football environment as a motivating force. Primary school pupils with low motivation and self-esteem are offered practical and sports-related teaching content for 30 additional hours. The evaluation results of a randomized experiment suggest that PfS does not significantly improve math and reading performance of primary school students.

This paper examines which configuration of teaching activities maximizes student performance. For this purpose a nonparametric efficiency model is formulated that accounts for (1) self-selection of students and teachers in better schools and (2) complementary teaching activities. The analysis distinguishes both individual teaching (i.e., a personal teaching style adapted to the individual needs of the student) and collective teaching (i.e., a similar style for all students in a class). Moreover, we examine to which group of students the teacher is adapting his/her teaching style. The model is applied on the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study 2003 data. The main results show that high test scores are associated with teaching styles that emphasize problem solving and homework. In addition, teachers seem to adapt their optimal teaching style to the 70% least performing students.

This paper examines whether the closure of poor performing primary schools improved students' educational attainment. It is believed that school closure affects children's educational outcomes positively because children switch to better primary schools. At the same time, school closure creates a social disturbance such that educational outcomes may be affected negatively. There is no previous literature on the effect of this type of school closure on student performance. The empirical results indicate that student test scores are not affected by the school closure. Children are, however, tracked into higher secondary education levels after the school closure if they received more education years at the new primary school. This effect fades out and eventually becomes negative for children who received more than one education year at the new primary school. The results further suggest that there are no detrimental effects of a school closure in terms of educational performance.

Despite the increased attention to students leaving secondary education without a diploma numerous students still dropout yearly. This paper makes a distinction between the "individual perspective" and the "institutional perspective" of dropping out. The former is explored by multinominal logit models. We observe that particularly motivation of the student and interest in schooling of his/her parents are crucial predictors of the individual dropout decision. The institutional perspective is examined by ordered logit models. In particular, we discuss the influence of the first year of secondary education by analyzing the large differences in the number of dropouts in Dutch first year classes. We observe that, more than motivation, the first year of secondary education is crucial in shaping the dropping out decision. (Contains 7 notes, 1 figure, and 2 tables.)

In line with the Lisbon Agenda, set by the European Council in the year 2000, European governments formulated ambitious plans to halve the level of early school-leavers by 2012. This paper outlines the dropout prevention measures in the Netherlands and analyzes their influence at both the individual and school level. While most policy measures correlate negatively with the individual dropout decision, only "mentoring and coaching" (i.e., matching of students with a coach from public or private organizations), "optimal track or profession" (e.g., work placement) and "dual track" (i.e., re-entering education for dropout students) have a significant negative impact on the individual dropout decision. By means of quantile regressions, we observe that schools with a relatively high dropout rate benefit the most from dropout prevention measures. (Contains 4 tables, 1 figure, and 13 notes.)

This paper studies the optimal allocation of resources--in terms of school management, teachers, supporting employees and materials--in secondary schools. We use a flexible budget constrained output distance function model to estimate both technical and allocative efficiency scores for 448 Dutch secondary schools between 2002 and 2007. The results indicate that the average technical efficiency amounts to about 78 percent, implying that, with the given resources, schools could improve students' educational performance by 28 percent. In terms of allocative efficiency, we estimate a 0.65 percent overutilization of teachers while management and supporting personnel are underutilized. The outcomes indicate that, despite the significant variation among schools, the average school is close to the optimal allocation of teachers. (Contains 5 tables and 3 figures.)

A straightforward way to prevent students from leaving education without a higher secondary diploma is increasing the compulsory education age. The idea is that, by staying longer in school, more students eventually obtain a higher secondary diploma. This paper examines the impact of a one-year increase in compulsory school-age on dropping out of secondary education by a difference-in-differences analysis. For this, we exploit a recent compulsory education policy reform in the Netherlands. After controlling for confounding factors and observable covariates, we find that the one year increase in compulsory school-age reduces dropout by 2.5 percentage points. The effect, however, is entirely situated in the group non-liable to the policy reform. We observe that native Dutch vocational students, mostly without retention in grade, but also without a higher secondary diploma at hand, more often left school in the immediate period before the policy reform. Given the economic revival at that time, this may reflect anticipation of labor market opportunities. (Contains 8 tables and 5 figures.)

Abstract: We investigate the impact of performances of failure in nature conservation by means of a detailed reconstruction of the implementation of European Union conservation directives in the Netherlands. We distinguish performance and performativity, whereby the latter is the reality-effect of discourses affecting policy, and partly the result of deliberate performance. It is argued that the implementation history in the Netherlands reveals that even long-standing traditions of deliberation and spatial planning can be disrupted as an unintended consequence of international policy implementation. What was intended as a tool to promote long-term planning for nature conservation can in effect undermine both nature conservation and long-term planning. Only a high degree of reflexivity in the planning system can diminish the chances of misconceiving the spaces for negotiation and deliberation that are left open by the EU directives. Otherwise, a combination of unexpected events and unreflected routine responses will in all likelihood produce results highly diverging from the initial ambitions. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

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