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The strong relationship between education and life chances suggests that addressing educational disparities is one of the most important steps that can be taken to reduce wider social and economic inequalities. The volume’s introductory chapter examines recent trends in educational access, quality, persistence and achievement for marginalized populations around the world, measures them against countries’ commitments to providing universal education, and reviews the evidence of a causal link between educational attainment and a wide array of social and economic outcomes. Usefully summarizing the examples of success which later chapters explore in greater depth, it clearly demonstrates that increased equity in education can be achieved with the right combination of political commitment and practical solutions.

If Education for All is to be achieved, children and students with disabilities and learning and behaviour difficulties must be given the necessary support. This chapter discusses equity in secondary and tertiary education with a focus on children with disabilities and learning and behavioural difficulties, using an international database developed by the member countries of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It addresses, from an international policy perspective, five important areas involved in achieving equity in education for all students: resource distribution, gender, access, outcomes and process. A fundamental premise of this chapter is that equity should be understood in terms of maximising outcomes for all students, including those with disabilities and learning difficulties, by finding the most effective balance in resource distribution and access.

Nearly all ethical issues in teaching can be formulated in terms of what it takes to be a good teacher. This chapter focuses on the ethical issues in death and dying, especially as they overlap with end-of-life issues in medical ethics. What should be the pedagogical aims in teaching these topics to undergraduates? This is an ethical issue addressing the stance of the teacher towards the students and what it means to be a good teacher. The current trend in educational assessment is to focus on the outcomes of education, generally in terms of skills gained. The skills of consulting with others in the emotionally-charged time of facing death and making good decisions are rarely covered. We need to face our limitations in knowing what count as good decisions and well-developed skills. Interdisciplinary courses that focus on difficult decisions are important new developments in education, but they are hard to teach well, challenging conceptions of what a good course is.

This introductory chapter addresses five major reasons for evidence-based practice and three philosophies of science that might serve to under gird it. The five reasons are ethical, legal, clinical, educational, and economic reasons. The ethical reasons found that in every major Code of Ethics for school service providers there was a mandate for staying current with the research literature. The legal reasons include both case law and federal legislation. Case law looks at three US Supreme Court rulings that define the legal standard for scientific evidence. Both the No Child Left Behind Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Improvement Act use the same definition of scientifically based research. Clinical reasons included standards of care, avoiding harm, and optimal practice. Educational outcomes that can be improved include school behavior, academic performance, and parental school engagement. Economic reasons include greater efficiency of time, money, and resources. The major philosophies of science include positivism, constructivism, and critical realism.

This chapter discusses overall trends in children's time doing homework and study. It analyses differences in trends associated with parental education to explore the extent to which trends in time doing homework and study reflect socio-economic differences in educational outcomes. Despite increasing levels of school attainment, children from lower socio-economic backgrounds overall persistently obtain fewer qualifications from school than those from relatively more advantaged families. The chapter also studies trends in children's time reading and their participation in a wide range of cultural activities, such as going to galleries and museums or the cinema and sporting events. Middle-class parents typically possess relatively high levels of cultural capital, evidenced in their relatively higher qualification and participation in different cultural practices, which may in turn help sustain socio-economic differences in educational outcomes for children.

We conducted a survey covering 20% of villages with 200-1000 population in rural Guinea-Bissau. We interviewed household heads, care-givers of children, and their teachers and schools. We analysed results from 9,947 children, aged 7-17, tested for literacy and numeracy competency. Only 27% of children were able to add two single digits, and just 19% were able to read and comprehend a simple word. Our unannounced school checks found 72% of enrolled children in grades 1-4 attending their schools, but the schools were poorly equipped. Teachers were present at 86% of schools visited. Despite surveying 351 schools, we found no examples of successful schools where children reached reasonable levels of literacy and numeracy for age. Our evidence suggests that interventions that raise school quality in these villages, rather than those which target enrollment, may be most important to generate very sharp improvements in children’s educational outcomes.

This chapter describes the importance of peer effects and offers new empirical evidence on their existence. Estimating peer effects is difficult. First, one must decide on the appropriate set of educational outcomes believed to be sensitive to peer attributes. Second, one must specify the relevant peer attributes. Third, and perhaps most difficult, one must contend with the fact that selection bias is rampant in the estimation of peer effects. The chapter uses a unique data set that combines data for three schools from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's College and Beyond data for the entering class of 1989, along with phonebook data identifying roommates, to implement a quasi-experimental empirical strategy aimed at measuring peer effects in academic outcomes. In particular, the chapter uses data on individual student's grades, Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores, and the SAT scores of their roommates to estimate the effect of roommates' academic characteristics on an individual's grades.

The objectives of this study are to analyse the trend and status of education in Odisha, and to examine transition rates, retention rates and dropout rates and other important performance indicators across the districts of Odisha. The findings indicate that Odisha’s performance on educational outcomes is mixed. Despite its visible improvement on the literacy front, more than a quarter of the population is still illiterate. Amidst indications of declining gender disparity in enrolment, female literacy is abysmally low. Girls, SCs, and STs continue to experience low enrolment rates and high dropouts. Odisha’s record on transition rates at elementary level is also miserable. The immediate necessity could be maintaining an ideal PTR and SCR. However, mere improvement in PTR may not suffice as appointment of teachers is mostly contractual. It is perhaps necessary to revisit the policy and undertake more targeted interventions.

Education of the deaf has a proud heritage with regard to scholarship and professional education. This is exemplified by the longevity of the International Congress on Education of the Deaf, which was first held in 1878. Just as it was at the time of the first International Congress, diversity continues to be the norm within the population of deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) learners on many different levels. Given that diversity, the logic for the resolutions made at the 1880 Congress in Milan, which sought to proscribe the use of sign language in education of the deaf, is questioned. It is argued that then, as now, differentiated educational responses were required to accommodate the diverse characteristics of the population of DHH learners. Current research examining the factors associated with the variance in developmental outcomes for DHH learners is reviewed. It is concluded that professionals involved in the identification and education of DHH children should be no less skeptical today about suggestions that there should, or could, be any “One True Path” to seek language, communication, and educational outcomes for all deaf children.

This chapter addresses in four national contexts—Austria, France, Germany, and the Netherlands—how formally stratified school systems affect the educational outcomes of second-generation Turks. A comparison of only educational outcomes seems in one way to favor France and the Netherlands, where the second generation goes further in school, an advantage that seems attributable to differences associated with formal stratification. However, early departure from school is also higher in France and the Netherlands, and the risk of unemployment for dropouts is very high; in Austria and Germany, by contrast, the apprenticeship system provides a stronger link to the labor market for those with limited educations, and this has favored the emergence of a large skilled blue-collar stratum in the second generation. In the end, which type of system will foster more successful integration in the long run remains unclear.

This chapter begins by studying the effects of the comprehensive education system and trends in educational performance and policy. It further explains some important trends, the role of different school policies, and the changes in these policies. The chapter focuses on the most important reforms evaluated, which is the increase in school expenditure; choice, accountability and competition; and changing education suggesting that government policy can improve things.

This chapter demonstrates that linguistic diversity in education raises specific social justice concerns based on the entrenched mismatch between schools as institutions with a monolingual habitus and the linguistically diverse societies they serve. Mainstreaming minority children into the dominant language presents a risk factor for poor academic, socioeconomic, behavioral, and emotional outcomes. Submersion education militates against the academic achievement of multilingual youths. This is the case because of the double challenge of having to learn curriculum content through the medium of a new language and having to learn a new language while studying in that language. Furthermore, the trend toward standardized assessment has undermined many improvements that have been made to minority education. Misrecognition of language learner status presents a continuing obstacle to academic achievement and locks some minority students into a vicious cycle where limited proficiency in the school language and poor academic outcomes continuously reinforce each other.

This chapter addresses the education experiences and outcomes of children of full or partial foreign parentage who grew up in Japan. It highlights some of their education strategies and practices and discusses how migration channels, parents' socioeconomic situations, and cultural backgrounds affect such practices and children's education achievements. Immigrant parents, regardless of their class and ethnic and cultural backgrounds, share an eagerness to advance their children's education. They strategize among different educational options and choose those they believe can produce better outcomes as well as match their mobility goals. However, the educational outcomes of the children vary widely, across national groups and along class lines. This has to do with the variant cultural, social, and economic resources that can be used to advance children's education. Meanwhile, the easiest educational choice available to them, Japanese public education, falls short in facilitating immigrant children's education mobility. The different choices of educational institutions in Japan include Japanese schools and “foreigner schools.” There is also the option of transnational education.

Chapter 8 considers the implications of this analysis for how we think about public policy and its value for achieving national goals. It also highlights the lessons that the success of landmark higher education policies holds for how lawmakers can promote equal opportunity. To fully understand the progress that American women have made in the last half century, we must take into account the landmark federal higher education programs that have contributed to the dramatic increase in women’s higher educational attainment. In a political context characterized by considerable hostility toward traditional welfare state programs like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families and food stamps, federal higher education programming represents one of the most politically viable methods of redistribution in the United States. Considering the value of higher education for promoting socioeconomic stability and political engagement, American lawmakers interested in promoting equal opportunity would do well to find ways to continue expanding access to college degrees.