Resultados del alumnado extranjero en SIMCE: de lo global a lo invisible

The academic results of foreign students have been the subject of study in recent years. In this sense, we can find various investigations that have shown that the reasons that lead foreign students to obtain lower results, compared to their native peers, are much more complex than merely socioeconomic level. An investigation is presented that had the purpose of describing and analyzing the results obtained by foreign students on Chile’s Simce mathematics and reading test for 4th and 2nd graders, during the years 2016, 2017 and 2018, across three levels: regional, communal and school-specific. A quantitative analysis was carried out using secondary data from the metropolitan region of Chile, as it is the region with the highest percentage of foreign students incorporated in recent years. The study specifically compare similar contexts, considering that socioeconomic variables are one of the main explanations for the gaps in results. Among the main findings, it was noted that in the Chilean case, the school takes on great relevance, since no statistically significant differences are observed between foreign and national students within these settings. This observation challenges thediscourses installed under the gaze of global analyses, highlighting the potential misinterpretation of data when examined at macro levels such as a country or a region. Considering the ethical relevance of working with school student results, the study employed anonymized data to ensure criteria of good practices and reserach ethics.