News Finding: Comparator schools had a slightly lower figure of students doing well at mathematics at first, but results soon caught up with those at schools who were taking part in intervention activities.
Paper Finding: This was because comparator schools had improved attainment more than intervention schools after intervention.
News Context: By looking at five years of data she found that among the 300 schools who participated there was no impact on maths GCSE results. Comparator schools had a slightly lower figure of students doing well at mathematics at first, but results soon caught up with those at schools who were taking part in intervention activities. The comparator group had a slightly higher proportion of pupils with free school meals, and the study did not find evidence that STEM interventions improved outcomes for less advantaged students.
Paper Context: However, the achievement gap between intervention and comparator narrowed down significantly after intervention for the longitudinal design. This was because comparator schools had improved attainment more than intervention schools after intervention. In most analysis intervention schools had a similar or slightly lower share of lower SES pupils (school-level deprivation measure) than the comparator.