Low and high BMIs were associated with decreasing levels of both physical and emotional well-being, but the deterioration in health status was more consistent in the physical than in other dimensions.

Independent of personal characteristics and key health measures (body mass index, hypertension and disability), these findings suggest that work-related, personal and family-related stressful life events contribute to the development and/or course of chronic diseases.

This paper examines the extent to which year-9 performance on the National Assessment Program-Language Arts and Numeracy (NAPLAN) predicts access to higher education as determined by subsequent achievement on year-12 Victoria Certificate of Education (VCE) exams. VCE performance is measured via three binary indicators: achieving an Australian tertiary admission rank (ATAR) above 50 ("ATAR50"), above 70 ("ATAR70"), and above 90 ("ATAR90"); and two continuous indicators: ATAR and the Tertiary Entrance Aggregate (TEA). We find that a four-way classification of year-9 NAPLAN results explains 35% of the variance in ATAR50, 37% in ATAR70 and 26% in ATAR90; and NAPLAN scores and basic demographic indicators explain 38% of the variance in ATAR and 42% of the variance in TEA values. Examining the joint effect of year-9 NAPLAN scores and socioeconomic status in predicting VCE outcomes, we find that while both are significant, NAPLAN scores have a much stronger effect. At the school level, we find that predictions of success rates based on NAPLAN scores and basic demographic indicators explain over 82% of the variance in school achievement in each of the binary indicators.

This paper compares two functionally different approaches to analyzing standardized test data: least-squares based value-added analysis, geared principally to supporting teacher and school accountability; and Betebenner's (2009) student growth percentiles, which focuses primarily on tracking individual student progress in a normative context and projecting probable trajectories of future performance. Applying the two methods to Australian standardized numeracy and reading test scores (NAPLAN) in grades 3 to 5 and 7 to 9, we find that although they are used differently, the two methods share key structural elements, and produce similar quantitative indicators of both individual student progress and estimated school effects.

Academically selective high schools are a polarizing topic in education policy, despite only having a small presence in some Australian states. They appear successful. The schools regularly top annual school rankings of university entrance results, but this is perhaps unsurprising given that their students are admitted based on their performances on an entrance exam.