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Large-scale international achievement studies such as PISA have been widely used to study how educational inequality compares across countries. Yet the various different biases that may affect these estimates are often not considered or are poorly understood. In this paper we draw upon the total survey error framework to provide a case study of the potential biases affecting estimates of the socio-economic achievement gaps using PISA data from Germany. The results illustrate how procedural and measurement errors have a substantial impact upon estimates of socio-economic achievement gradients in Germany, including how it compares with other countries. This leads us to conclude that estimates of socio-economic achievement gaps using the PISA data for Germany do not seem to be particularly robust. More generally, we argue that better articulation and reporting of such challenges with comparing socio-economic achievement gaps using large-scale international assessment data such as PISA are needed.

Rurality is known to be associated with a number of weaker educational outcomes, from lower attainment through to lower social mobility. This is why so much policy and practitioner focus has been directed at addressing the rurality gap in educational outcomes. In this paper, we use pupil-level data for Scotland to contribute to two dimensions of this problem. First, we explore the relationship between socio-economic deprivation and educational mobility across urban and rural primary schools in Scotland. This provides new insights on the issue of rural disadvantage. Second, we use our dataset to explore the socio-economic makeup of urban and rural schools in Scotland, documenting that schools located in the highest and lowest SIMD areas are more homogeneous than those in the middle. This is important for the classification of schools in targeting educational interventions to improve social mobility.

Children adopted from care become part of a hidden, but no less vulnerable, group in the education system and may be overlooked for allocation of additional support and guidance. Adoption is a relatively unique experience and adds layers of complexity, difference and vulnerability to young people's lives that are poorly understood and under-researched. Adopted adolescents face significant challenges in social, emotional and behavioural aspects of school life. An attainment gap persists throughout their educational career. Adoptees are strikingly absent from many conversations regarding care-experienced young people yet their needs and challenges are comparable with those of their peers remaining in the care system. Assumptions are made about adoptees' opportunity and capacity to recover, concealing challenges faced in adjusting to adoptive life, including education. The impact of adoptees' early experiences could lead to complex identity formation processes during adolescence, with potential implications for education experience and performance. This paper explores the potential of applying a "narrative adoptive identity" perspective to answer questions about how adopted children and young people experience school as an "adopted" person, i.e. how does their lived experience as an adopted member of a school community impact on their engagement with school, schoolwork and peer networks? The concept of 'communicative openness' is used to illustrate the vital role the school community plays in enabling adopted children to transition into and thrive in school. Taking a narrative adoptive identity approach may enable teachers to better meet adoptees' specific learning and teaching needs as dictated by their unique experiences and enhance opportunities for better educational progress.

The use of targeted additional funding for school-age education, intended to improve student attainment, is a widespread phenomenon internationally. It is slightly rarer that the funding is used to improve attainment specifically for the most disadvantaged students -- often via trying to attract teachers to poorer areas, or encouraging families to send their children to school. It is even rarer that funding is used to try and reduce the attainment gap between economically disadvantaged students and their peers, and almost unheard for the funding to be intended to change the nature of school intakes by making disadvantaged students more attractive to schools. These last two were the objectives set for Pupil Premium funding to schools in England. The funding started in 2011, for all state-funded schools at the same time, so there is no easy counterfactual to help assess how effective it has been. The funding is a considerable investment every year and it is therefore important to know whether it works as intended. This paper presents a time series analysis of all students at secondary school in England from 2006, well before the funding started, until 2019, the most recent year for which there are attainment figures. It overcomes concerns that the official attainment gap between students labelled disadvantaged and the rest is sensitive to demographic, economic, legal and other concurrent policy changes. It does this by looking at a stable group of long-term disadvantaged students. It is argued that this group would have attracted Pupil Premium funding if it had existed in any year and under any economic conditions. After 2010, these long-term disadvantaged pupils became substantially less clustered in specific schools in their first year and throughout their remaining school life. This improvement cannot be explained by economic or other factors used in this paper, and so it looks as though the Pupil Premium has been effective here. The picture for the attainment gap at age 16 is more mixed. It is partly confused by changes in the grading of assessments in 2014 and again from 2016. The reasons why the improvements are less clear than at primary school are discussed, and they involve the nature of evidence available to secondary schools to help them improve the attainment of their most disadvantaged students.

Schools have the potential to provide a place of education and sanctuary for children and young people of all backgrounds. The rise in mental health problems in children and young people in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly in relation to growing inequities, means that identifying ways in which schools can help respond to this growing mental health crisis demands urgent attention. This paper reports on case studies carried out in two London comprehensive schools, exploring how aspects of school culture impact (both positively and negatively) on student mental health. Methods comprised in-depth interviews with school staff and parents, focus groups with students and documentary analysis of relevant materials. Fieldwork was conducted during spring 2021 as schools were returning to face-to-face learning following national periods of lockdown. Our study shows how schools might attempt to drive positive mental health outcomes through aspects of school culture and uses a system framework to explore complexities around cause and effect in this area. Key findings include the considerable differences in school mental health provision, challenges in the identification of student mental health needs and the importance of recognising how the mental health of teachers must be considered alongside that of students. Overall, we highlight particular dilemmas of the post-lockdown era that our findings indicate for the education sector, and suggest there may be value in reframing the apparent conflict between 'attainment gaps' and personal development, moving towards an educational approach with greater complementarity of these aims.

Despite extensive research on attainment grouping, the impact of attainment grouping on pupil attainment remains poorly understood and contested. This paper presents evidence from a study conducted with 2944 12-13 year olds, from 76 schools in England, who were allocated to between-class attainment groups ('setting') in English and mathematics over the first 2 years of secondary schooling. After controlling for prior attainment, pupils in the top set performed significantly better than pupils in the middle and bottom sets in both English and mathematics. The findings indicate a widening gap in attainment, especially in the case of English. Findings, especially in the case of mathematics, provide more evidence of a relative benefit for pupils placed in top sets than a relative detriment for those in bottom sets.

Education is key to the structural integration of immigrants and their children. While research indicates that educational inequalities by migration background are a serious issue, relatively little is known about when, how and why they develop. The current paper adds to the literature by investigating to what extent achievement gaps by migration background develop during the primary school period. Drawing on data from a national longitudinal study of children in Ireland (N = 7577) and using structural equation modelling, it presents a path model of host language achievement. The results indicate that a large part of the disadvantages in English language achievement by migration background during primary school could be attributed to achievement gaps that already existed before school. Moreover, given earlier achievement, the effect of having a migration background was often insignificant or even positive, suggesting that disparities remain relatively stable or even decrease during the period of formal schooling.

This paper critiques international trends towards certain school practices aimed at promoting equity and social justice by closing gaps in specific learning outcomes among students. It argues that even though some of these practices (e.g. individualised student support, data-driven leadership) improve learning outcomes for certain groups considered 'disadvantaged', they fail to have a genuine impact on the issue. They remain 'locked' in the logic of social mobility, reaffirming the legitimacy of a hierarchical system underpinned by competitive individualism, which unfairly distributes social opportunities under the guise of 'merit' and 'justice'. The paper argues that unless students develop awareness of the subtle injustices legitimised by the current system, no specialised interventions will ever tackle inequity, but will, instead, reinforce it. Yet, attempts to explicitly challenge mainstream school practices are likely to face harsh resistance from system agents due to being so ingrained in school cultures. An alternative strategy is suggested which, without being too subversive, could raise students' awareness--what Freire called 'conscientização'. This would entail the application of participatory action research (PAR), under the cloak of traditional (system-aligned) action research. Such PAR, despite its political character, would initially appear to fulfil the performative role of more technical interventions (e.g. raising test scores), but in such a way that 'conscientização' also happens in the process. This may set the ground for social reform, encouraging the transition to a more sustainable and equitable society based on collectivity and solidarity.

Drawing on a secondary analysis of official statistics, this paper examines the changing scale of the inequality of achievement between White students and their Black British peers who identify their family heritage as Black Caribbean. We examine a 25-year period from the introduction of the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE), in 1988, to the 20th anniversary of the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 2013. It is the first time that the Black/White gap has been analysed over such a long period. The paper reviews the changing place of the Black/White gap in education debates and notes that, despite periods when race equality has appeared to be high on the political agenda, it has never held a consistent place at the heart of policy. Our findings shed light on how the Black/White gap is directly affected, often in negative ways, by changes in education policy. Specifically, whenever the key benchmark for achievement has been redefined, it has had the effect of restoring historic levels of race inequity; in essence, policy interventions to "raise the bar" by toughening the benchmark have actively widened gaps and served to maintain Black disadvantage. Throughout the entire 25-year period, White students were always at least one and a half times more likely to attain the dominant benchmark than their Black peers. Our findings highlight the need for a sustained and explicit focus on race inequity in education policy. To date, the negative impacts of policy changes have been much more certain and predictable than occasional attempts to reduce race inequality.

Children with special educational needs (SEN) are known to experience lower average educational attainment than other children during their school years. But we have less insight into how far their poorer educational outcomes stem from their original starting points or from failure to progress during school. The extent to which early identification with SEN delivers support that enables children who are struggling academically to make appropriate progress is subject to debate. This is complicated by the fact that children with SEN are more likely to be growing up in disadvantaged families and face greater levels of behavioural and peer problems, factors which themselves impact attainment and progress through school. In this paper, we evaluate the academic progress of children with SEN in England, drawing on a large-scale nationally representative longitudinal UK study, the Millennium Cohort Study, linked to administrative records of pupil attainment. Controlling for key child, family and environmental factors, and using the SEN categories employed at the time of data collection, we first establish that children identified with SEN in 2008, when they were age 7, had been assessed with lower academic competence when they started school. We evaluate their progress between ages 5-7 and 7-11. We found that children identified with SEN at age 7 tended to be those who had made less progress between ages 5 and 7 than their comparable peers. However, children with SEN continued to make less progress than their similarly able peers between ages 7 and 11. Implications are discussed.

Whether someone has ever had free school meal (FSM) eligibility over a six-year period is the measure of socio-economic disadvantage currently used in the English school system. It is used to monitor the socio-economic gap in achievement in the education system, to identify particular children at risk of low achievement and to direct funding to particular children and schools. In this paper we assess how well this measure predicts pupil attainment in secondary school in comparison to other measures of socio-economic background known to influence pupil attainment, such as parental education or income. We ask whether the FSM measure is an adequate proxy for a pupil's socio-economic disadvantage in an educational context. To do this we draw on the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England and matched administrative data. We find that the FSM eligibility measure correlates highly with other measures of socio-economic disadvantage, however it does not identify all children living in what would be deemed deprived households. We then compare the extent to which the FSM eligibility measure predicts educational achievement relative to other measures of deprivation and find that its predictive power is only marginally lower than many richer survey measures. This provides some reassurance on its use in policy.

By the time children leave primary school there is a large socio-economic gap in their reading proficiency. There are a number of potential explanations for this socio-economic gap and in this paper we investigate the role of three particular genes and gene-environment interactions in determining children's reading skills, using the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) dataset. We find that whilst these genes are indeed correlated with reading outcomes, effect sizes are small and sensitive to the choice of test used and the sample selected. Our results suggest that these leading candidate genes can jointly explain just 2% of the socio-economic gap in children's reading test scores. We conclude that the influence of these three genes on children's reading ability is limited, and their role in producing socio-economic gaps in reading ability is even more limited still.

Despite extensive research on attainment grouping, the impact of attainment grouping on pupil attainment remains poorly understood and contested. This paper presents evidence from a study conducted with 2944 12–13 year olds, from 76 schools in England, who were allocated to between‐class attainment groups ('setting') in English and mathematics over the first 2 years of secondary schooling. After controlling for prior attainment, pupils in the top set performed significantly better than pupils in the middle and bottom sets in both English and mathematics. The findings indicate a widening gap in attainment, especially in the case of English. Findings, especially in the case of mathematics, provide more evidence of a relative benefit for pupils placed in top sets than a relative detriment for those in bottom sets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports findings from a study commissioned by the (then) Department for Children, Schools and Families. The research mapped the provision, and explored the impact, of supplementary schools and aimed specifically to develop further understanding as to how supplementary schools might raise the attainment of Black and Minority Ethnic pupils. Drawing on a national survey and case study data from 12 supplementary schools, we highlight a range of perceived impacts identified by teachers, pupils and parents and problematise the concept of impact. We identify the unique contribution and impact that supplementary schools make to the mainstream school attainment of pupils from diverse (linguistic, cultural, ethnic) backgrounds. We suggest that there is much to be learnt by the mainstream school sector about the difference supplementary school education makes to minority ethnic children, while questioning whether mainstream indicators of impact should be applied to supplementary schools.

The purpose of this paper is to identify how ethnically diverse schools can discursively maintain a good reputation. Reputation allows attracting the mixed student population necessary to achieve inclusion or closing the gap between the attainment of ethnic majority and minority students. In semi-market educational systems where students are free to attend the school of their choice yet education has no market price, the share of ethnic minority students functions as one of the main indicators of a school's educational quality. Ethnically diverse schools are thus perceived as offering lower quality education. Based on the case of a highly ethnically diverse, inclusive secondary school in the exclusive Flemish secondary educational semi-market, we found that a positive reputation could be achieved through three related discursive practices: affirming the high-quality education of the school, redefining the relation between students' ethnic diversity and educational quality and reconstructing ethnic diversity as an educational resource. (Contains 1 figure.)

This paper reports an analysis of the educational attainment and progress between age 11 and age 14 of over 14,500 students from the nationally representative Longitudinal Study of Young People in England. The mean attainment gap in national tests at age 14 between White British and several ethnic minority groups was large, more than three times the size of the gender gap, but at the same time only about one-third of the size of the social class gap. Socioeconomic variables could account for the attainment gaps for Black African, Pakistani and Bangladeshi students, but not for Black Caribbean students. Further controls for parental and student attitudes, expectations and behaviours indicated minority ethnic groups were on average more advantaged on these measures than White British students, but this was not reflected proportionately in their levels of attainment. Black Caribbean students were distinctive as the only group making less "progress" than White British students between age 11 and 14 and this could not be accounted for by any of the measured contextual variables. Possible explanations for the White British-Black Caribbean gap are considered. (Contains 3 tables and 1 figure.)

This study contributes to the research on ethnic educational inequality, by deepening the current understanding of education initiatives organised by the ethnic‐cultural minoritised communities most affected by these inequalities. A univariate analysis was performed on data from an original survey conducted in Flanders, in which 816 teachers and 3037 pupils from 60 primary schools were asked about, among other things, their experience with and their perceptions of these educational initiatives. The results of this analysis show that these community‐based education initiatives are widely attended by ethnic minority youth, but also that teachers in mainstream schools are rarely informed or even aware of the existence of these initiatives, or the important role they play in their pupils' lives. The broader social and scientific implications are discussed in this paper, as little to no similar larger‐scale research exists that maps the relationship between these community‐based education initiatives and mainstream educational institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Schools have the potential to provide a place of education and sanctuary for children and young people of all backgrounds. The rise in mental health problems in children and young people in the wake of the COVID‐19 pandemic, particularly in relation to growing inequities, means that identifying ways in which schools can help respond to this growing mental health crisis demands urgent attention. This paper reports on case studies carried out in two London comprehensive schools, exploring how aspects of school culture impact (both positively and negatively) on student mental health. Methods comprised in‐depth interviews with school staff and parents, focus groups with students and documentary analysis of relevant materials. Fieldwork was conducted during spring 2021 as schools were returning to face‐to‐face learning following national periods of lockdown. Our study shows how schools might attempt to drive positive mental health outcomes through aspects of school culture and uses a system framework to explore complexities around cause and effect in this area. Key findings include the considerable differences in school mental health provision, challenges in the identification of student mental health needs and the importance of recognising how the mental health of teachers must be considered alongside that of students. Overall, we highlight particular dilemmas of the post‐lockdown era that our findings indicate for the education sector, and suggest there may be value in reframing the apparent conflict between 'attainment gaps' and personal development, moving towards an educational approach with greater complementarity of these aims. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Education is key to the structural integration of immigrants and their children. While research indicates that educational inequalities by migration background are a serious issue, relatively little is known about when, how and why they develop. The current paper adds to the literature by investigating to what extent achievement gaps by migration background develop during the primary school period. Drawing on data from a national longitudinal study of children in Ireland (N = 7577) and using structural equation modelling, it presents a path model of host language achievement. The results indicate that a large part of the disadvantages in English language achievement by migration background during primary school could be attributed to achievement gaps that already existed before school. Moreover, given earlier achievement, the effect of having a migration background was often insignificant or even positive, suggesting that disparities remain relatively stable or even decrease during the period of formal schooling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on a secondary analysis of official statistics, this paper examines the changing scale of the inequality of achievement between White students and their Black British peers who identify their family heritage as Black Caribbean. We examine a 25-year period from the introduction of the General Certificate of Secondary Education ( GCSE), in 1988, to the 20th anniversary of the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 2013. It is the first time that the Black/White gap has been analysed over such a long period. The paper reviews the changing place of the Black/White gap in education debates and notes that, despite periods when race equality has appeared to be high on the political agenda, it has never held a consistent place at the heart of policy. Our findings shed light on how the Black/White gap is directly affected, often in negative ways, by changes in education policy. Specifically, whenever the key benchmark for achievement has been redefined, it has had the effect of restoring historic levels of race inequity; in essence, policy interventions to 'raise the bar' by toughening the benchmark have actively widened gaps and served to maintain Black disadvantage. Throughout the entire 25-year period, White students were always at least one and a half times more likely to attain the dominant benchmark than their Black peers. Our findings highlight the need for a sustained and explicit focus on race inequity in education policy. To date, the negative impacts of policy changes have been much more certain and predictable than occasional attempts to reduce race inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whether someone has ever had free school meal ( FSM) eligibility over a six-year period is the measure of socio-economic disadvantage currently used in the English school system. It is used to monitor the socio-economic gap in achievement in the education system, to identify particular children at risk of low achievement and to direct funding to particular children and schools. In this paper we assess how well this measure predicts pupil attainment in secondary school in comparison to other measures of socio-economic background known to influence pupil attainment, such as parental education or income. We ask whether the FSM measure is an adequate proxy for a pupil's socio-economic disadvantage in an educational context. To do this we draw on the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England and matched administrative data. We find that the FSM eligibility measure correlates highly with other measures of socio-economic disadvantage, however it does not identify all children living in what would be deemed deprived households. We then compare the extent to which the FSM eligibility measure predicts educational achievement relative to other measures of deprivation and find that its predictive power is only marginally lower than many richer survey measures. This provides some reassurance on its use in policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports an analysis of the educational attainment and progress between age 11 and age 14 of over 14,500 students from the nationally representative Longitudinal Study of Young People in England. The mean attainment gap in national tests at age 14 between White British and several ethnic minority groups was large, more than three times the size of the gender gap, but at the same time only about one-third of the size of the social class gap. Socioeconomic variables could account for the attainment gaps for Black African, Pakistani and Bangladeshi students, but not for Black Caribbean students. Further controls for parental and student attitudes, expectations and behaviours indicated minority ethnic groups were on average more advantaged on these measures than White British students, but this was not reflected proportionately in their levels of attainment. Black Caribbean students were distinctive as the only group making less progress than White British students between age 11 and 14 and this could not be accounted for by any of the measured contextual variables. Possible explanations for the White British-Black Caribbean gap are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tens of thousands of young people leave school with no or very few qualifications in England. This paper asks: what is the ethnic dimension of the low achievement problem? We focus on six aspects, using the National Pupil Database: whether the relation between ethnicity and incidence of low achievement is symmetrical with the relation between ethnicity and achievement; whether economic disadvantage is an equally large risk factor for low achievement among pupils of all ethnicities; whether the relationship of ethnicity with low achievement varies by peer group; whether the relationship between gender and chances of low achievement differs by ethnic group; whether the relation between ethnicity and low achievement changes with age; and lastly, whether there is sorting by ethnicity into schools of better or worse quality. We find that: (1) the relationship between low achievement and achievement is not symmetrical and, therefore, that it is valuable to measure low achievement directly rather than as the negative of achievement; (2) economic disadvantage has a stronger effect on White students than those of ethnic minorities; (3) the relationship between ethnicity and low achievement does vary with age; (4) ethnic peer-group effects are not significant; (5) the gender gap in the probability of low achievement is significantly larger for most ethnic groups compared with the White group, at least by one measure of low achievement; and (6) attending poorer-quality schools is part of the explanation of differential ethnic minority performance. We offer explanations for our findings and for the presence and/or persistence of inter-ethnic differences in the chances of low achievement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gender differences in academic performance and achievement have been of policy concern for decades—both interest in lower performance by girls in the areas of mathematics and science and, more recently, in boys' underperformance in most other academic areas. Much previous research has focused on gender gaps, while overlooking other factors that may play a role, such as ethnicity. This study looks at the gender differences in cognitive assessments at age five across ethnic groups in a sample of English children from the Millennium Cohort Study. While girls generally perform better than boys, general trends mask some differences across ethnic groups. Results show gender gaps at the mean are largest for black and Pakistani and Bangladeshi children and smallest for white children, they are also larger for the teacher‐rated assessments than for the survey‐administered tests. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]