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This paper provides important new insights into the reasons for the observed gap in educational attainment between children of immigrants and natives in Denmark using a dynamic discrete model of educational choices to determine at what stages of their educational careers children of immigrants face barriers to educational progression and how background characteristics affect educational choices at different points in the educational system. The main findings of the paper are that dropout rates from vocational upper secondary education are much higher among children of immigrants and that strengthening family characteristics reduces the dropout rates. However, behavioral differences and/or differences in constraints and institutional factors are also important barriers and thus determinants of the observed educational gaps as is age at immigration.

Over the past decade, the number of ethnic minorities in Denmark has increased rapidly, now accounting for over 8 per cent of the total population. This paper presents results from a number of recent studies regarding the educational choices of minority children from less developed countries. An important social concern is that the educational attainment of these children is much lower than among native Danes. The studies show that that a main reason for the education gap is very high dropout rates from vocational schools among minority children and that inadequate Danish language proficiency of immigrants, parents and their children, is an important reason for the high dropout rates, as are inadequate educational preparedness from grade school and insufficient apprenticeship positions available for minority youth. Socio-economic background, however, has relatively little effect. Recent policy changes to reduce dropout rates from vocational schools are reviewed and additional policy interventions are proposed.