This paper considers an unavoidable feature of the school environment, class rank. What are the long run effects of a student's ordinal rank in elementary school? This research shows that students with a higher third grade academic rank, conditional on achievement and classroom effects, have higher subsequent test scores, are more likely to take…

The big-fish-little-pond effect (BFLPE) model predicts students' academic self-concept to be negatively predicted by the achievement level of their reference group, controlling for individual achievement. Despite an abundance of empirical evidence supporting the BFLPE, there have been relatively few studies searching for possible moderators.…