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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 explores the role of family trajectories during childhood in explaining inequalities by maternal education in children's math and reading skills using harmonized, longitudinal, and nationally representative surveys, which follow children over the course of primary and lower secondary school in four high‐income countries (England, France, Germany, and the United States). As single parenthood and family transitions are more likely among less educated parents and are associated with fewer resources for children, we explore whether growing up outside a stable two‐parent family mediates educational inequalities in math and reading scores. Results show a strong educational gradient in family trajectories in the four countries, but this varies by child age and by country. Children who experience a family transition record lower test scores, although the magnitude differs by the type of postseparation arrangements. Overall, family trajectories are strongly associated with children's math and reading scores but, because of the importance of selectivity in family trajectories, they play only a modest role in explaining the skills gaps by maternal education, considerably less than determinants such as income. The penalties associated with not living within a stable two‐parent family are always larger in the United States and England than in France and Germany. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper challenges the notion that quantitative data – as a numeric truth – exist independent of a nation's political and racial landscape. Utilising large-scale national attainment data, the analysis challenges the belief that 'White working class' children in England, especially boys, are 'the new oppressed' – as a former equality adviser has publicly claimed. The analysis applies Quantitative Critical Race Theory, or 'QuantCrit', an emerging quantitative sub-field of Critical Race Theory in education. The paper argues that far from being 'oppressed', White boys continue to enjoy achievement advantages over numerous minoritised groups; especially their peers of Black Caribbean ethnic origin. Additionally, the analysis uniquely exposes racialised trends of 'equivalency' in core subject qualifications, whereby minority ethnic children are over-represented in certain lower-status qualifications that are counted as equivalent in education statistics but not in the real world labour market. The analysis concludes that knowing misrepresentations of quantitative data are at the heart of an institutional process through which race and racism are produced, legitimised and perpetuated in education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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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 article, co-authored by two research-active teachers with the support of their academic partner, reports on the resistance of an urban primary school in a northern city of England to the label 'disadvantaged school' and various judgements that refuse to take into account its holistic work with students and families from different and diverse minority ethnic backgrounds. The article will argue that there are flaws in the ways the school's story is officially told where it does not acknowledge what is being done to address students' experiences of immigration, poverty and deprivation, and the cultural barriers they often negotiate in coming to school. As a driver for change, practitioner research foregrounds the authenticity of school and classroom contexts and puts them under scrutiny as a means of informing strategic decisions. Utilising a case study design, this paper pulls together a range of data evidence to construct its narrative and tell the school's story, working in collaboration with its university academic partner. In doing so, it contributes to our understanding of practitioner research within challenging urban school settings, under pressure from centralised conceptualisations of achievement gaps and school performance. It puts many of these ideas under scrutiny and asks fundamental questions about curriculum, pedagogy and accountability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the increasing professionalisation of school business practitioners in the state school system in England. Often referred to a 'school business managers' or 'school business leaders', this cohort of the school workforce have been increasingly tasked with leading crucial site-based management functions in schools, such as finance and budgeting, human resources and school operations. As this area of practitioner activity has grown over the last two decades, 'school business leadership' has increasingly been positioned by education policy makers and professional bodies as a distinct field of practice within the school system. However, despite increasing recognition of the value of school business leadership within the school system, there is evidence of continued tensions around the inclusion of such practitioners in matters of leadership. Further, there is a paucity of scholarly research exploring school business activity and the increasing professionalisation of its practitioners. Therefore, this article serves to contribute to this gap by exploring the evolution of school business practitioners and their positioning within the wider field of education in England. It argues for further research in England and for knowledge exchange with other education contexts to share insight and explore future potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we study whether substituting family inputs with school resources in an academically oriented environment has an impact on achievement in high-stakes national examinations. We use administrative data for England to estimate the effect of attending a selective boarding school that admits an unusually high share of pupils with low socio-economic status on attainment at the end of compulsory education. By using propensity score matching we obtain comparable control groups in selective non-boarding schools. Our main finding is that the probability of being in the top decile of achievement in the exams increases by about 18 percentage points compared to 59% for controls. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article, written by three research-active teachers and their academic partner, registers concerns with the ways the so-called 'achievement gap' is portrayed in policy announcements in England. It charts a challenge to the current view that it is the task of urban nursery and primary schools to train children to be school-ready. It portrays a collective professional judgement that some young children from less affluent backgrounds face a range of barriers to their learning on entry, which hampers their success at primary school. Further, it argues these barriers arise from children's multiple vulnerabilities which cannot be encapsulated by a single category of need such as eligibility for Free School Meals or a Special Educational Need represented in official national-school quantitative data. This article proceeds to report on three inter-linked teacher inquiry projects, which seek to define and identify the range of vulnerabilities faced by some young children and consider intervention measures that will address their academic and social learning needs. The intention is to show that a more refined view of identifying these needs based on a research-informed reading of young children's multiple vulnerabilities, framed by their social context, will lead to more equitable provision of primary schooling experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]