Ethnic Discrimination in High School Grading: Evidence from a Field Experiment

We rigorously test for ethnic discrimination in high school grading in Sweden. A random sample of the national tests in the Swedish language is graded both non-blind by the student’s own teacher and blind without any identifying information. The increase in the test score due to non-blind grading is significantly higher for students with Swedish background compared to students with foreign background. This discrimination effect is sizeable, and explains the entire difference in test scores between students with Swedish and foreign background.Discrimination; Field experiments; Education

Are boys discriminated in Swedish high schools?

Girls typically have higher grades than boys in school and recent research suggests that part of this gender difference may be due to discrimination of boys. We rigorously test this in a field experiment where a random sample of the same tests in the Swedish language is subject to blind and non-blind grading. The non-blind test score is on average 15 % lower for boys than for girls. Blind grading lowers the average grades with 13 %, indicating that personal ties and/or grade inflation are important in non-blind grading. But we find no evidence of discrimination against boys. The point estimate of the discrimination effect is close to zero with a 95 % confidence interval of ±4.5 % of the average non-blind grade.Discrimination; Field experiments; Grading; Education; Gender

Ethnic discrimination in high school grading: Evidence from a field experiment

We rigorously test for ethnic discrimination in high school grading in Sweden. A random sample of the national tests in the Swedish language is graded both non-blind by the student's own teacher and blind without any identifying information. The increase in the test score due to non-blind grading is significantly higher for students with Swedish background compared to students with foreign background. This discrimination effect is sizeable, and explains the entire difference in test scores between students with Swedish and foreign background

Syns vi på det virtuella mötet? : En fallstudie om hur gruppchefer arbetar med organisationskultur i kontexten av distansarbete

Titel: Syns vi på det virtuella mötet? En fallstudie om hur gruppchefer arbetar med organisationskultur i kontexten av distansarbete. Författare: Frida Höglin och Erik Nylund Handledare: Janet Johansson Bakgrund: Distansarbetet har ökat globalt under de senaste åren, inte minst till följd av Covid-19 pandemin. En övergång i arbetsförhållanden, från det fysiska kontoret, till att medarbetare istället arbetar på distans, ligger till grund för en mängd utmaningar för organisationen och dess ledare. En av dess utmaningar är hur ett företag och dess ledare kan främja och upprätthålla en befintlig organisationskultur när medarbetarna arbetar på distans och inte längre interagerar med varandra dagligen.  Syfte: Studiens syfte är att, utifrån ett ledarskapsperspektiv, undersöka hur gruppchef arbetar för att främja företagets organisationskultur, i den dagligaverksamheten, i kontexten av distansarbete. Metod: Studie genomfördes som en kvalitativ fallstudie med en abduktiv forskningsansats. Den empiriska datainsamlingen utgjordes av semistrukturerade intervjuer med 8 respondenter på ett fallföretag. Slutsats: Studien finner att gruppchefen i sitt ledarskap arbetar aktivt med att främja organisationskulturen i företaget. Gruppchefen arbetar för att tydligt förmedla medarbetarens fortsatta koppling till företaget genom en kontinuerlig individuell kontakt och genom att skapa plattformar där gruppen kan interagera och socialisera med varandra. Detta möjliggör för organisationskulturella uttryck att fortsatt förmedlas och mottas mellan gruppchefen och medarbetaren och medarbetarna sinsemellan. Avslutningsvis finner studien att inom dessa interaktioner ämnar gruppchefen använda så informationsrika kommunikationskanaler som möjligt.Title: Catch you at the virtual meeting? A case study regarding how group managers workwith organizational culture in a company where employees work remotely. Authors: Frida Höglin and Erik Nylund Supervisor: Janet Johansson Background: Globally there has been a growth in remote working over the recent years. The change in working conditions, transitioning from office-based work to working remotely, possibly threatens a company's organizational culture, as a large part of it is rooted in the interaction between colleagues. It is therefore crucial for a company and its leaders to figure out how they can promote and maintain an organizational culture when the employees work remotely and no longer interact on a daily basis. Purpose: Using a leadership perspective, the purpose of the study is to examine how group managers work to promote a corporation’s organizational culture in the context of remote working. Method: This study used a qualitative case study with an abductive approach. The collection of empirical data was done using semi-structured interviews with 8 respondents in one case company. Conclusion: The study finds that group managers in their leadership role actively work to promote the organization's culture. The group manager works to clearly convey employees’ continued connections to the company by maintaining a continuous individual contact, and by creating platforms where the group can carry on interacting and socializing with each other. This allows for expressions of organizational culture to continue to be conveyed and received between the group manager and co-workers and the co-workers among themselves. Lastly, the study finds how in these interactions the group managers aim to utilize as information rich communication channels as possible.

Syns vi på det virtuella mötet? : En fallstudie om hur gruppchefer arbetar med organisationskultur i kontexten av distansarbete

Titel: Syns vi på det virtuella mötet? En fallstudie om hur gruppchefer arbetar med organisationskultur i kontexten av distansarbete. Författare: Frida Höglin och Erik Nylund Handledare: Janet Johansson Bakgrund: Distansarbetet har ökat globalt under de senaste åren, inte minst till följd av Covid-19 pandemin. En övergång i arbetsförhållanden, från det fysiska kontoret, till att medarbetare istället arbetar på distans, ligger till grund för en mängd utmaningar för organisationen och dess ledare. En av dess utmaningar är hur ett företag och dess ledare kan främja och upprätthålla en befintlig organisationskultur när medarbetarna arbetar på distans och inte längre interagerar med varandra dagligen.  Syfte: Studiens syfte är att, utifrån ett ledarskapsperspektiv, undersöka hur gruppchef arbetar för att främja företagets organisationskultur, i den dagligaverksamheten, i kontexten av distansarbete. Metod: Studie genomfördes som en kvalitativ fallstudie med en abduktiv forskningsansats. Den empiriska datainsamlingen utgjordes av semistrukturerade intervjuer med 8 respondenter på ett fallföretag. Slutsats: Studien finner att gruppchefen i sitt ledarskap arbetar aktivt med att främja organisationskulturen i företaget. Gruppchefen arbetar för att tydligt förmedla medarbetarens fortsatta koppling till företaget genom en kontinuerlig individuell kontakt och genom att skapa plattformar där gruppen kan interagera och socialisera med varandra. Detta möjliggör för organisationskulturella uttryck att fortsatt förmedlas och mottas mellan gruppchefen och medarbetaren och medarbetarna sinsemellan. Avslutningsvis finner studien att inom dessa interaktioner ämnar gruppchefen använda så informationsrika kommunikationskanaler som möjligt.Title: Catch you at the virtual meeting? A case study regarding how group managers workwith organizational culture in a company where employees work remotely. Authors: Frida Höglin and Erik Nylund Supervisor: Janet Johansson Background: Globally there has been a growth in remote working over the recent years. The change in working conditions, transitioning from office-based work to working remotely, possibly threatens a company's organizational culture, as a large part of it is rooted in the interaction between colleagues. It is therefore crucial for a company and its leaders to figure out how they can promote and maintain an organizational culture when the employees work remotely and no longer interact on a daily basis. Purpose: Using a leadership perspective, the purpose of the study is to examine how group managers work to promote a corporation’s organizational culture in the context of remote working. Method: This study used a qualitative case study with an abductive approach. The collection of empirical data was done using semi-structured interviews with 8 respondents in one case company. Conclusion: The study finds that group managers in their leadership role actively work to promote the organization's culture. The group manager works to clearly convey employees’ continued connections to the company by maintaining a continuous individual contact, and by creating platforms where the group can carry on interacting and socializing with each other. This allows for expressions of organizational culture to continue to be conveyed and received between the group manager and co-workers and the co-workers among themselves. Lastly, the study finds how in these interactions the group managers aim to utilize as information rich communication channels as possible.

Are boys discriminated in Swedish high schools?

Girls typically have higher grades than boys in school and recent research suggests that part of this gender difference may be due to discrimination of boys. We rigorously test this in a field experiment where a random sample of the same tests in the Swedish language is subject to blind and non-blind grading. The non-blind test score is on average 15 % lower for boys than for girls. Blind grading lowers the average grades with 13 %, indicating that personal ties and/or grade inflation are important in non-blind grading. But we find no evidence of discrimination against boys. The point estimate of the discrimination effect is close to zero with a 95 % confidence interval of ±4.5 % of the average non-blind grade

Automated Essay Scoring for Swedish

We present the first system developed for automated grading of high school essays written in Swedish. The system uses standard text quality indicators and is able to compare vocabulary and grammar to large reference corpora of blog posts and newspaper articles. The system is evaluated on a corpus of 1 702 essays, each graded independently by the student’s own teacher and also in a blind re-grading process by another teacher. We show that our system’s performance is fair, given the low agreementbetween the two human graders, and furthermore show how it could improve efficiency in a practical setting where one seeks to identify incorrectly graded essays