IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/inq/inqwps/ecineq2006-27.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Social segregation in secondary schools: How does England compare with other countries?

Author

Listed:
  • Stephen P. Jenkins

    (Institute for Social and Economic Research, University of Essex, and DIW Berlin)

  • John Micklewright

    (Southampton Statistical Sciences Research Institute (S3RI) and School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton)

  • Sylke V. Schnepf

    (S3RI, University of Southampton)

Abstract

We provide new evidence about the degree of social segregation in England’s secondary schools, employing a cross-national perspective. Analysis is based on data for 27 rich industrialised countries from the 2000 and 2003 rounds of the Programme of International Student Assessment (PISA), using a number of different measures of social background and of segregation, and allowing for sampling variation in the estimates. England is shown to be a middle-ranking country, as is the USA. High segregation countries include Austria, Belgium, Germany and Hungary. Low segregation countries include the four Nordic countries and Scotland. In explaining England’s position, we argue that its segregation is mostly accounted for by unevenness in social background in the state school sector. Focusing on this sector, we show that cross-country differences in segregation are associated with the prevalence of selective choice of pupils by schools. Low-segregation countries such as those in the Nordic area and Scotland have negligible selection in schools. High segregation countries like Austria, Germany and Hungary have separate school tracks for academic and vocational schooling and, in each case, over half of this is accounted for by unevenness in social background between the different tracks rather than by differences within each track.

Suggested Citation

  • Stephen P. Jenkins & John Micklewright & Sylke V. Schnepf, 2006. "Social segregation in secondary schools: How does England compare with other countries?," Working Papers 27, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
  • Handle: RePEc:inq:inqwps:ecineq2006-27
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.ecineq.org/milano/WP/ECINEQ2006-27.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert Hutchens, 2004. "One Measure of Segregation," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 45(2), pages 555-578, May.
    2. Rosalind Levacic & Stephen Machin & David Reynolds & Anna Vignoles & James Walker, 2000. "The Relationship between Resource Allocation and Pupil Attainment: A Review," CEE Discussion Papers 0002, Centre for the Economics of Education, LSE.
    3. Ganzeboom, H.B.G. & de Graaf, P.M. & Treiman, D.J. & de Leeuw, J., 1992. "A standard international socio-economic index of occupational status," WORC Paper 92.01.001/1, Tilburg University, Work and Organization Research Centre.
    4. Hutchens, Robert, 2001. "Numerical measures of segregation: desirable properties and their implications," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 42(1), pages 13-29, July.
    5. Michael R. Ransom, 2000. "Sampling Distributions of Segregation Indexes," Sociological Methods & Research, , vol. 28(4), pages 454-475, May.
    6. Simon Burgess & Brendon McConnell & Carol Propper & Deborah Wilson, 2004. "Sorting and Choice in English Secondary Schools," The Centre for Market and Public Organisation 04/111, The Centre for Market and Public Organisation, University of Bristol, UK.
    7. Hutchens, Robert M., 1991. "Segregation curves, Lorenz curves, and inequality in the distribution of people across occupations," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 21(1), pages 31-51, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Piergiacomo Sibiano & Giuseppe Catalano, 2010. "Investigating school autonomy: a comparison between England and Italy," Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación volume 5, in: María Jesús Mancebón-Torrubia & Domingo P. Ximénez-de-Embún & José María Gómez-Sancho & Gregorio Gim (ed.), Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación 5, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 8, pages 155-184, Asociación de Economía de la Educación.
    2. Coral Río & Olga Alonso-Villar, 2010. "Gender Segregation in the Spanish Labor Market: An Alternative Approach," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 98(2), pages 337-362, September.
    3. Diane Reay, 2007. "'Unruly Places' : Inner-city Comprehensives, Middle-class Imaginaries and Working-class Children," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 44(7), pages 1191-1201, June.
    4. Stephen Gibbons & Shqiponja Telhaj, 2007. "Are Schools Drifting Apart? Intake Stratification in English Secondary Schools," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 44(7), pages 1281-1305, June.
    5. Olga Alonso-Villar & Coral del Río, 2009. "Industrial segregation of female and male workers in Spain," Working Papers 0905, Universidade de Vigo, Departamento de Economía Aplicada.
    6. Coral del Río & Olga Alonso-Villar, 2008. "Occupational and industrial segregation of female and male workers in Spain: An alternative approach," Working Papers 84, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
    7. Olga Alonso Villar & Coral del Río, 2010. "Segregation of female and male workers in Spain: occupations and industries," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 194(3), pages 91-121, June.
    8. Elena Fumagalli & laura Fumagalli, 2009. "Like oil and water or chocolate and peanut butter? Ethnic diversity and social participation of young people in England," Working Papers 2009_21, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    9. Jairo G Isaza Castro & Karen Hernandez & Karen Guerrero & Jessy Hemer, 2017. "Computing occupational segregation indices with standard errors: an ado file application with an illustration for Colombia," 2017 Stata Conference 18, Stata Users Group.
    10. Hámori, Szilvia & Köllő, János, 2011. "Whose Children Gain from Starting School Later? Evidence from Hungary," IZA Discussion Papers 5539, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alonso-Villar, Olga & del Río, Coral, 2010. "Local versus overall segregation measures," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 60(1), pages 30-38, July.
    2. Oscar Volij, 2018. "Segregation: theoretical approaches," Chapters, in: Conchita D’Ambrosio (ed.), Handbook of Research on Economic and Social Well-Being, chapter 21, pages 480-503, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    3. Tugce, Cuhadaroglu, 2013. "My Group Beats Your Group: Evaluating Non-Income Inequalities," SIRE Discussion Papers 2013-49, Scottish Institute for Research in Economics (SIRE).
    4. Hutchens, Robert, 2015. "Symmetric measures of segregation, segregation curves, and Blackwell’s criterion," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 63-68.
    5. Emmanuel Vazquez, 2016. "Segregación escolar por nivel socioeconómico. Midiendo el fenómeno y explorando sus determinantes," Económica, Departamento de Economía, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, vol. 62, pages 121-184, January-D.
    6. Pascaline Vincent & Frédéric Chantreuil & Benoït Tarroux, 2012. "Appraising the breakdown of unequal individuals in large French cities," Economics Working Paper Archive (University of Rennes 1 & University of Caen) 201220, Center for Research in Economics and Management (CREM), University of Rennes 1, University of Caen and CNRS.
    7. Castro Campos, Bente, 2013. "Human capital differences or labor market discrimination? The occupational outcomes of ethnic minorities in rural Guizhou (China)," Studies on the Agricultural and Food Sector in Transition Economies, Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition Economies (IAMO), volume 73, number 73.
    8. SILBER Jacques, 2012. "Measuring Segregation: Basic Concepts and Extensions to Other Domains," LISER Working Paper Series 2012-20, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER).
    9. Coral del Río & Olga Alonso-Villar, 2007. "An alternative proposal for measuring occupational segregation," Working Papers 82, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
    10. Tugce Cuhadaroglu, 2013. "My Group Beats Your Group: Evaluating Non-Income Inequalities," Discussion Paper Series, School of Economics and Finance 201308, School of Economics and Finance, University of St Andrews.
    11. Stephan Humpert, 2012. "Age and Gender Differences in Job Opportunities," Working Paper Series in Economics 235, University of Lüneburg, Institute of Economics.
    12. Ray Chaudhury, Anjan & Sinha, Madhabendra, 2019. "Multi-group segregation for nominal and ordinal categorical data: An application to socio-religious groups in India," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 41(6), pages 1095-1108.
    13. Chakravarty, Satya R. & Silber, Jacques, 2007. "A generalized index of employment segregation," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 185-195, March.
    14. Diego C. Botassio & Rodolfo Hoffmann, 2020. "Measuring gender segregation," Economic Theory Bulletin, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 8(1), pages 25-47, April.
    15. Ricardo Mora & Javier Ruiz-Castillo, 2009. "The invariance properties of the mutual information index of multigroup segregation," Research on Economic Inequality, in: Occupational and Residential Segregation, pages 33-53, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    16. Coral del Río & Olga Alonso-Villar, 2008. "Occupational and industrial segregation of female and male workers in Spain: An alternative approach," Working Papers 84, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
    17. Coral Río & Olga Alonso-Villar, 2010. "Gender Segregation in the Spanish Labor Market: An Alternative Approach," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 98(2), pages 337-362, September.
    18. Casilda Lasso de la Vega & Oscar Volij, 2020. "The Measurement Of Income Segregation," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 61(4), pages 1479-1500, November.
    19. Ricardo Mora & Javier Ruiz-Castillo, 2003. "Additively Decomposable Segregation Indexes. The Case of Gender Segregation by Occupations and Human Capital Levels in Spain," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 1(2), pages 147-179, August.
    20. Dhongde, Shatakshee, 2017. "Measuring Segregation of the Poor: Evidence from India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 111-123.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    social segregation; secondary schools; England; cross-national comparison; PISA.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D39 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Other
    • I21 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Analysis of Education
    • I39 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Other

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inq:inqwps:ecineq2006-27. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Maria Ana Lugo (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ecineea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.