Results

Journal article

The Economic Journal:

Autonomous Schools and Strategic Pupil Exclusion

This paper studies whether pupil performance gains in autonomous schools in England can be attributed to the strategic exclusion of poorly performing pupils. England has had two phases of academy school introduction, the...Read more...

Journal article

Journal of the European Economic Association:

Does additional spending help urban schools? An evaluation using boundary discontinuities

This study exploits spatial anomalies in school funding policy in England to provide new evidence on the impact of resources on student achievement in urban areas. Anomalies arise because the funding allocated to Local E...Read more...

Journal article

Fiscal Studies:

Academies 2 - the new batch: the changing nature of academy schools in England

The English education system has undergone large-scale restructuring through the introduction of academy schools. The most salient feature of these schools is that, despite remaining part of the state sector, they operat...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Nursery attendance and children's outcomes

The UK government has expanded the popular ‘free entitlement’ to part-time early education and care from a universal 15 hours per week to 30 hours per week for working parents. But research by Jo Blanden and co-authors r...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Teacher turnover: does it matter for pupil achievement?

We add to a small literature examining whether teacher turnover affects academic achievement, focussing on age-16, state secondary school students, using a unique dataset of linked students and teachers in England. We ad...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Quality in early years settings and children’s school achievement

Childcare quality is often thought to be important for influencing children’s subsequent attainment at school. The English Government regulates the quality of early education by setting minimum levels of qualifications f...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Primary academies in England

Attendance at a primary academy leads to no discernible improvement in pupils’ test scores, according to research by Andrew Eyles, Stephen Machin and Sandra McNally. This suggests that further extension of the academies ...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Unexpected school reform: academisation of primary schools in England

The change of government in 2010 provoked a large structural change in the English education landscape. Unexpectedly, the new government offered primary schools the chance to have ‘the freedom and the power to take contr...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Faster broadband: are there any educational benefits?

Governments around the world are committing substantial public funds to upgrading their broadband infrastructure, partly in the hope of promoting education. Research findings by Rosa Sanchis-Guarner and colleagues raise ...Read more...

Journal article

Labour Economics:

School reforms and pupil performance

The relationship between school reforms, specifically those involving the introduction of new school types, and pupil performance is studied. The particular context is the introduction of academy schools in England, but ...Read more...

CentrePiece article

in brief... Children's reading: evaluating a new teaching method

Children at risk of struggling with their reading get long-term benefits from ‘synthetic phonics’, the current favoured method among education policy-makers in England. The benefits for disadvantaged pupils justify the f...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Academy schools and pupil outcomes

Nearly two thirds of secondary schools in England now have academy status. Andrew Eyles and Stephen Machin are tracking the impact of this unprecedented educational reform on pupil outcomes - in both the first wave of '...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Academies 2: the new batch

The English education system has undergone a large restructuring programme through the introduction of academy schools. The most salient feature of these schools is that, despite remaining part of the state sector, they ...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

The introduction of academy schools to England's education

We study the origins of what has become one of the most radical and encompassing programmes of school reform seen in the recent past amongst advanced countries – the introduction of academy schools to English secondary e...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Does Management Matter In Schools?

We collect data on operations, targets and human resources management practices in over 1,800 schools educating 15-year-olds in eight countries. Overall, we show that higher management quality is strongly associated with...Read more...

CentrePiece article

In brief: Does management matter in schools?

Better school management is associated with better pupil achievement, according to CEP analysis of the quality of management practices in schools in a range of developed and developing countries. Renata Lemos notes that ...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Everybody needs good neighbours?

There are large disparities between the achievements, behaviour and aspirations of children in different neighbourhoods – but does this mean that the place where you grow up determines your later life outcomes? Steve Gib...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Does school spending matter?

Increases in resources for schools are typically more effective in disadvantaged schools and for disadvantaged pupils. That is one of the many findings of a review by Steve Gibbons and Sandra McNally of the research evid...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

The Effects of Resources Across School Phases: A Summary of Recent Evidence

This report provides an overview and discussion of the past decade of academic evidence on the causal effects of resources in schooling on students’ outcomes. Early evidence lacked good strategies for estimating the effe...Read more...

CentrePiece article

In brief: Language barriers? The impact of non-native English speakers in the classroom

In recent years there has been an increase in the number of children going to school in England who do not speak English as a first language. We investigate whether this has an impact on the educational outcomes of nativ...Read more...

CentrePiece article

In brief: Urban schools: does money make a difference?

This research paper is motivated by a long tail at the bottom of the educational distribution, educational inequality between those from high and low socio-economic groups and the question as to what role an increase in ...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Mental Health and Education Decisions

Mental health problems - and depression in particular - have been rising internationally. The link between poor mental health and poor educational outcomes is particularly interesting in the case of the UK which has a lo...Read more...

CEP discussion paper

Mass Education or a Minority Well Educated Elite in the Process of Development: the Case of India

This paper analyses whether in developing countries mass education is more growth enhancing than to have a minority well educated elite. Using the Indian census data as a benchmark and enrollment rates at different level...Read more...

CentrePiece article

Teachers' Pay and Pupil Performance

If you pay peanuts, do you get monkeys? If teachers were better paid and higher up the national income distribution, would there be an improvement in pupil performance? Peter Dolton and Oscar Marcenaro-Gutierrez examine ...Read more...

Journal article

Journal of Labor Economics:

Faith primary schools: better schools or better pupils?

We estimate the causal effect of attending a state Faith school on primary education achievement in England using administrative student-level data and implementing various strategies to control for students' selection i...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Are England’s Academies More Inclusive or More ‘Exclusive’? The Impact of Institutional Change on the Pupil Profile of Schools

In 2002 the former Labour government launched the Academies Programme of school improvement. This scheme has targeted entrenched issues of pupil underachievement within state secondary schools located in deprived areas, ...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Changing School Autonomy: Academy Schools and their Introduction to England's Education

In this paper, we study a high profile case - the introduction of academy schools into the English secondary school sector - that has allowed schools to gain more autonomy and flexible governance by changing their school...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

The Timing of Parental Income and Child Outcomes: The Role of Permanent and Transitory Shocks

How do shocks to parental income drive adolescent human capital, including years of schooling, high school dropout, university attendance, IQ and health? A structural model decomposes household shocks into permanent and ...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Variation in Educational Outcomes and Policies Across Countries and of Schools within Countries

This study examines the variation in educational outcomes across and within countries using the TIMSS mathematics tests. It documents the wide cross-country variation in the level and dispersion of test scores. Countries...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

The Changing Economic Advantage From Private School

Despite its relatively small size, the private school sector plays a prominent role in British society. This paper focuses on changing wage and education differentials between privately educated and state educated indivi...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Individual Teacher Incentives, Student Achievement and Grade Inflation

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SERC/Urban and Spatial Programme Discussion Paper

Education and Income Inequality in the Regions of the European Union

This paper provides an empirical study of the determinants of income inequality across regions of the EU. Using the European Community Household Panel dataset for 102 regions over the period 1995-2000, it analyses how mi...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Mobility and School Disruption

We consider the influence that mobile pupils have on the academic achievements of other pupils in English primary schools. We find that immobile pupils in year-groups (à la US “grades”) that experience high pupil entry r...Read more...

CentrePiece article

In brief: Faith Primary Schools: Better Schools or Better Pupils?

Average levels of pupil achievement in religiously affiliated primary schools seem to be higher than in the secular sector. Research by Stephen Gibbons and Olmo Silva examines whether faith schools really are better or i...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Urban Density and Pupil Attainment

We explore the association between urban density and pupil attainment using three cohorts of pupils in schooling in England. Although – as widely recognised – attainment in dense urban places is low on average, this is n...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Are Schools Drifting Apart? Intake Stratification in English Secondary Schools

The issue of social segregation in schools has seen a recent resurgence of interest – in the US, UK and internationally – as the debate rages on about whether policies that expand families’ freedom to choose amongst scho...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Faith Primary Schools: Better Schools or Better Pupils?

We provide estimates of the effect of attending a Faith school on educational attainment progress during the Primary education phase in England. We argue that there are no credible instruments for Faith school attendance...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Peer Effects and Pupil Attainment: Evidence from Secondary School Transition

It is a common belief that children will thrive if educated amongst better class and schoolmates. It is a belief that guides many parents in their choice of school, and has important implications for policy on school cho...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

From the Cradle to the Labor Market? The Effect of Birth Weight on Adult Outcomes

Lower birth weight babies have worse outcomes, both short-run in terms of one year mortality rates and longer run in terms of educational attainment and earnings. However, recent research has called into question whether...Read more...

CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

New Technology in Schools: Is There a Payoff?

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CEE/Education and skills discussion paper

Competition, Choice and Pupil Achievement

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CEP discussion paper

Educational Attainment, Labour Market Institutions, and the Structure of Production

A key feature of OECD economic growth since the early 1970s has been the secular decline in manufacturing's share of GDP and the secular rise of service sectors. This paper examines the role played by relative prices, t...Read more...