Relationship between the Unified State Exam and Higher Education Performance Tatyana Khavenson, Anna Solovyeva Tatyana Khavenson education. The research involved about Received in junior researcher at the International 19,000 students enrolled at five Russian August 2013 Laboratory for Education Policy Analy- universities between 2009 and 2011. As sis, Institute of Education, National Re- long as the sample included institutions search University—Higher School of of different profiles, individual regres- Economics. Email:
[email protected] sions were calculated for each facul- Anna Solovyeva ty. A metaanalysis of regression coeffi- intern researcher at the International cients was performed later to bring the Laboratory for Education Policy Analy data together. Firstyear average grades sis, Institute of Education, National Re- were used as the key academic perfor- search University—Higher School of mance indicator. It was found that USE Economics. Email: soloveva.anna@ scores were only related to performance gmail.com in the second and the subsequent years through performance in the first year, i. e. Address: 13, Milyutinsky lane, Moscow, indirectly. The research results allow 101000, Russian Federation. to conclude that predictive capacity of Abstract. This paper analyzes the composite USE scores is high enough possibility of predicting performance to accept this examination as a valid ap- in higher education based on results of plicant selection tool. The paper also the Unified State Exam (USE). In par- analyzes the relationship between USE ticular, we test the hypothesis that USE scores and results of subjectspecif- scores in different subjects are equally ic academic competitions, another stu- efficient predictors of further academic dent selection tool.