This report looks beyond high performing schools, and digs deeper into the geographical patterns of socio-economic segregation in the comprehensive system as a whole, showing the wider impacts of selection. Along with a link to an interactive map, this report provides unprecedented insight into the dynamics of secondary school admissions in…

The United Kingdom has a considerable attainment gap between students from the most and the least advantaged backgrounds. This gap opens up in the early years, with disadvantaged pupils already over four months behind their more advantaged peers by the time they start at primary school. The gap then continues to widen as students progress through…

The Sutton Trust's "Recruitment Gap" (see ED601203) powerfully demonstrated the impact of levels of disadvantage in a school can have on teacher recruitment and retention. This dynamic of segregation is fundamental to many of the divides in the education system and Britain's lack of social mobility. More schools with socio-economically…

Prior attainment is a major factor in both educational and career progression, but even young people who do show strong initial academic potential from less advantaged backgrounds often fall behind their better-off peers during their time in education. Indeed, the first piece in our Social Mobility: The Next Generation series found that by GCSE,…

Comprehensive schools offer a platform to foster educational equity by educating and improving the skills of pupils across the whole socio-economic spectrum. However, consistency and equal access to high quality education is key for a comprehensive system to provide a platform for upward social mobility. Measuring school quality is a complex…

Successive governments have promoted academy sponsorship as a way to improve the educational achievement of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. As the academies programme has developed, policymakers have increasingly seen academy chains, and especially multi-academy trusts (MATs) as the best way of working to improve the performance of…

This report reviews national and international research on widening participation and access programmes to find out which methods are most likely to help disadvantaged pupils get into higher education. Analysis of existing research in the United States and United Kingdom suggests that summer schools, tutoring, and mentoring are among five methods…

A university degree is regarded as the "gold standard" to set young people up for their future careers, but it may not be the best path for potential graduates and others. With the ever increasing debt burden faced by graduates, and a glut of graduates in the labour market, might there be another option? This report looks at the…

Secondary schools have managed significant changes in the Key Stage 4 curriculum they offer in response to changes in performance tables and accountability measures from 2010 onwards. In this piece, the authors assess how these changes are starting to affect the educational choices and successes of pupils at the ages of 16 and 18. This is…

Successive governments have promoted academy sponsorship as a way to improve the educational achievement of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. As the academies programme has developed, policymakers have increasingly seen academy chains, and especially multi-academy trusts (MATs) as the best way of working to improve the performance of…

Successive governments have promoted academy sponsorship as a way to improve the educational achievement of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. As the academies programme has developed, policymakers have increasingly seen academy chains (especially multi-academy trusts) as the best method for fostering professionalism, value for money and…

This report looks at children's education careers by drawing on data from a sample of more than 3,000 young people who have been tracked through school since the age of three. In particular, this research identified a group of disadvantaged children, establishing what predicted their academic success at the age of 11 and following them up to age…

Academies were started in 2000 to alter the fortunes of failing schools that disproportionately served students from some of the nation's poorest communities. By helping these schools with the support of philanthropic, educational and business partners, the intention was to improve the lives of young people from the least privileged backgrounds by…

The "Assisted Places Scheme" was introduced in 1980 by the Conservative Government to provide a "ladder of opportunity" for academically able students from poor homes. Over the next 17 years, more than 75,000 pupils received means-tested assistance from public funds to attend the most selective and prestigious private schools…

The Sutton Trust has always recognised the importance of fair school admissions to improving social mobility. Researchers from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), the University of Cambridge, and NatCen Social Research (NatCen), along with David Jesson from the University of York, were asked by the Sutton Trust to investigate entry into…