There is widespread international concern about post-16 participation rates in science, with women's under-representation constituting a particular issue. This paper contributes to these debates through a novel, critical examination of the role of masculinity within boys' negotiations of science aspirations. Drawing on a UK longitudinal study of…

Education policy in the U.S. in the last two decades has emphasized large-scale assessment of students, with growing consequences for schools, teachers, and students. Given the high stakes of such tests, it is important to understand the relationships between students' answers to test items and their knowledge and skills in the tested content…