SociologyExchange.co.uk Shared Resource

Educational Attainment: Report Activity

Contained in the following information pack is a variety of findings from the Department of Education and www.statistics.gov.uk.

Using this ‘mish-mash’ of information (supplemented with any recent news items you may find), arrange the findings into a coherent report which analyses statistics regarding gender, class and ethnicity in education – both current and trends over time (if you can find even older stats to illustrate the changes - even better). You must print your report for each member of your research team and be prepared to summarise your findings to the rest of the class to help share findings which they may not have come across. You must not dismantle or de-face this pack; you may only take facts and figures from it. You have 75 minutes to complete the task. STARTING NOW.

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Ethnicity

The highest achieving ethnic groups were:

Chinese pupils – 71.6 percent of pupils achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics

Indian pupils – 67.0 percent of pupils achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics

Mixed White and Asian pupils – 62.3 percent of pupils achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics.

The chart below shows the percentage of pupils who achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent by ethnic group.

Key Stage 4: Proportion of pupils achieving 5 A*-C GCSEs including English and Mathematics by ethnic group, 2009

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The lowest attaining groups were Traveller of Irish Heritage pupils and Gypsy/Roma pupils, where respectively 9.2 and 9.1 percent of pupils achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics. For both ethnic groups this is an increase from 2008. Care should be taken in making comparisons due to the low number of eligible pupils from these ethnic groups.

Other than the ethnic groups with very small number of pupils, the lowest achieving were Black Caribbean, Pakistani, Other Black and pupils from a Mixed White and Black Caribbean background. However the gaps between these groups and the attainment of all pupils have decreased since 2006:

For Black Caribbean pupils, 39.4 percent achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics. Compared with the all pupils figure, this is an attainment gap of 11.3 percentage points, a decrease from 14.5 percentage points in 2006.

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For Pakistani pupils, 42.9 percent achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics. This is an attainment gap of 7.8 percentage points, a decrease from 9.4 percentage points in 2006.

For Other Black pupils, 41.2 percent achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics. This is an attainment gap of 9.5 percentage points, a decrease from 12.8 percentage points in 2006.

For pupils from the mixed White and Black Caribbean ethnic group, 42.3 percent achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics, this is an attainment gap of 8.4 percentage points, a decrease from 11.4 percentage points in 2006.

Girls outperformed boys in all of the minority ethnic groups for Key Stage 4. However there is some variability in the gender differences across the ethnic groups. The largest differences were seen in:

Other Asian pupils, 61.9 percent of girls achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics compared to 47.5 percent of boys – a gender gap of 14.4 percentage points.

Chinese pupils, 79.2 percent of girls achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics compared to 64.8 percent of boys – a gender gap of 14.4 percentage points.

Black Caribbean pupils, 45.6 percent of girls achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics compared to 33.0 percent of boys – a gender gap of 12.6 percentage points.

The lowest difference was seen in Irish pupils with 59.7 percent of girls achieving 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics. This compares to 56.5 percent of boys, a gender gap of 3.2 percentage points.

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Free School Meal Eligibility

Key Stage 4 attainment was lower for pupils who were known to be eligible for free school meals than pupils who were not eligible for free school meals.

54.2 of pupils not eligible for free school meals achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics compared to 26.6 percent of pupils known to be eligible for free school meals – an attainment gap of 27.6 percentage points. Since 2006 this gap has decreased from 28.1 percentage points.

93.6 of pupils not eligible for free school meals achieved 5 or more A*-G GCSEs including English and mathematics compared to 81.5 percent of pupils known to be eligible for free school meals – an attainment gap of 12.1 percentage points. Since 2006 this gap has decreased from 15.9 percentage points.

Of those pupils known to be eligible for free school meals, there are variations in achievement by gender and ethnic group, for example:

For White British boys, 19.0 percent achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics. This shows an attainment gap of 31.7 percentage points compared to all pupils. This is slightly higher than in 2006 when this attainment gap was 30.2 percentage points.

For Black Caribbean boys 22.4 percent achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs or equivalent including English and mathematics. This shows an attainment gap of 28.3 percentage points compared to all pupils. This is lower than in 2006 when this attainment gap was 29.1 percentage points.

The chart below shows the variation in the percentage of pupils who achieved 5 or more A*-C grade GCSEs by gender, free school meal eligibility and ethnic group.

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