Search

Many countries are moving towards more inclusive education. Yet there is only little evidence on the effect of moving students with special educational needs from segregated educational settings to regular classrooms on students' medium-term outcomes like enrolment in upper secondary programmes. This study contributes to filling this gap using combined evidence from matching and instrumental variable approaches. The results suggest that mainstreaming students substantially increases enrolment and progress towards the certificate. Earlier mainstreaming tends to be more effective. Academic skills at the end of compulsory schooling are identified as an important mediator.

Using large scale survey data, I document substantial differences in behavioural engagement (defined as involvement in academic and social activities, cooperative participation in learning, and motivation and effort) and emotional engagement levels (defined as a sense of belonging and well-being at school) between students with and without special needs in regular classes and show that the impact of engagement, in particular motivation and effort and participation in learning activities, on academic achievement is equally important for SEN and non-SEN students. The results highlight the importance of inclusion initiatives aimed at improving the engagement of SEN students included in regular classrooms.

We combine data from three studies for Denmark in the PISA 2000 framework to investigate differences in the native-immigrant test score gap by country of origin. In addition to the controls available from PISA data sources, we use student-level data on home background and individual migration histories linked from administrative registers. We find that second-generation students from Lebanon and Pakistan increase their reading scores substantially compared with the first generation, while there is no improvement for students from Turkey, the single largest immigrant group. Native-immigrant gaps in mathematics are generally smaller than in reading skills, suggesting that part of the native-immigrant gap is due to lower language proficiency of immigrant students. (Contains 8 tables, 1 figure, and 10 notes.)

This study examines potential sources of the immigrant-native test score gap using data from the recently released PISA replicate study for Copenhagen (Denmark). It is shown that even in a school system that is successfully equalizing endowments of traditional resources across schools attended by native and immigrant students, differences in other school inputs remain. Especially, the culture of achievement appears less well developed at schools attended by immigrant students (even though general teacher support is at similar levels), and also the peer composition and the provision of specialized teachers is less favourable. These results point at several relevant policy recommendations. (Contains 5 tables and 29 notes.)