PURPOSE: to analyze and compare grades in bulletins of students who lived in rural area and in urban area, with both kinds studying in the same urban schools. METHODS: we analyzed the grades in the first semester of 2005 of 641 student in the basic education of the urban public schools of Terenos / MS, being 81.1% residents in urban area and 18.9% in rural area. The students were compared according to their performances in the discipline of Portuguese, Mathematics, Sciences, Physical Education, Geography, History and Artistic Education, considering the place of residence (urban/rural), period of study (day / night), type of school (municipal/state) and gender. RESULTS: no significant difference was found in the performances of the students from series 1 to 4, in none of the disciplines. From series 5 to 8 we found a slightly better performance in the students who lived in the urban area, measured by t-Student test. However, if upon jointly analyzing all the variable, none of them was preponderant in explaining the performance of the student, measured by multiple lineal regression. CONCLUSION: no significant differences were found in the school performance between students in the urban and rural area.
Education; Learning; Underachievement; Rural Population
