Muriel Meunier
Immigration and student achievement: Evidence from Switzerland
paper investigates empirically whether immigrant students switzerland perform poorly compared native counterparts provides explanations using national sample 2000 pisa programme international student assessment database first analyze impact immigrant status pupils achievement find negative significant impact immigrant status test scores reading mathematics science literacy even controlling set characteristics decompose observed reading score gap swiss immigrant students identify whether gaps endowments explain test score differences along distribution lower endowments explain achievement gap reading swiss secondgeneration immigrants however lower returns explain around one quarter achievement gap swiss firstgeneration immigrants weakest pupils