Browse by Topics
- Covid-19 Education Research for Recovery
- Early childhood
- K-12 Education
- Post-secondary education
- Access and admissions
- Education outside of school (after school, summer…)
- Educator labor markets
- Educator preparation, professional development, performance and evaluation
- Finance
- Inequality
- Markets (vouchers, choice, for-profits, vendors)
- Methodology, measurement and data
- Multiple outcomes of education
- Parents and communities
- Politics, governance, philanthropy, and organizations
- Program and policy effects
- Race, ethnicity and culture
- Standards, accountability, assessment, and curriculum
- Students with Learning Differences
Breadcrumb
Search EdWorkingPapers
Shwetlena Sabarwal
Out of Sight, Out of Mind? The Gap between Students’ Test Performance and Teachers’ Estimations in India and Bangladesh
This is one of the first studies of the mismatch between students’ test scores and teachers’ estimations of those scores in low- and middle-income countries. Prior studies in high-income countries have found strong correlations between these metrics. We leverage data on actual and estimated scores in math and language from India and Bangladesh and find that teachers misestimate their students’ scores and that their estimations reveal their misconceptions about students in most need of support and variability within their class. This pattern is partly explained by teachers’ propensity to overestimate the scores of low-achieving students and to overweight the importance of intelligence. Teachers seem unaware of their errors, expressing confidence in estimations and surprise about their students’ performance once revealed.