To what extent does student's socioeconomic status predict their science achievement in Turkey? a research using PISA data

The main purpose of this research is to examine in detail the relationship between the socioeconomic status (SES) of 15-year-old students in Turkey and their science literacy using the PISA 2015 data. For this purpose, PISA 2015 data obtained from 5895 students from 187 schools in Turkey were analyzed using the IDB Analyzer, HLM, and SPSS software. The results of the analyses revealed that family SES explained 9% of the variance in students' science achievement. In addition, the HLM analysis showed that the average SES of schools in Turkey alone explained 46.5% of the between-school variance in science achievement. In addition, when the relationship between the SES level of the families and students' science achievement was examined by regression analyses within each statistical region, SES explained science achievement the highest in the Northeastern Anatolia region at 22%, while it explained only a small variance in the Eastern Black Sea and Middle Eastern Anatolia regions. Furthermore, within the scope of this study, the sub-dimensions of the SES variable were examined, and the extent to which these sub-dimensions explained science achievement was analyzed. Among the sub-dimensions of SES, the occupational level of the mother explained the largest variance (13%) in students' science achievement.