School Context and Gender Inequalities in Reading Achievement.

The objective of this article is to present new findings regarding the impact of the characteristics of the school environment on the gender gap in education. Based on data from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), the extent to which the existing gender gap in reading comprehension scores is conditioned by different school contexts and the level of gender equality in each country is assessed. Using multi-level analysis, we find that the social composition of the school and the behaviour of students has a significant impact on the gender gap, though in a differentiated manner. The gender gap in education increases when the school climate is worse, and it decreases when the concentration of parents with low education levels is low. In societies with higher levels of gender equality, girls see their scores in reading comprehension increase more than boys. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]