The IBSA forum is an important collaboration of India-Brazil-South Africa to address the social developmental challenges of developing countries through South-South Cooperation. All three countries share same colonial history and at present have developing economies and struggling to provide best public services to their citizens through the…

The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) is a study of 15-year-old students' performance in reading, mathematics, and science literacy conducted every 3 years. The PISA 2018 results provide a global view of U.S. students' performance compared to their peers in nearly 80 countries and education systems. By design, PISA aims to…

This paper examines the discourse on school meals, as evidence suggests that political agendas feed into policy making. The paper fills a void by proposing new insights into how school meals could be reformed, following reflections from a doctoral study and a review of the changing narrative on school food in England. Recommendations include…

The UK government is planning to increase the number of pupils attending state-funded selective grammar schools, claiming that this will assist overall standards, reduce the poverty attainment gap and so aid social mobility. Using the full 2015 cohort of pupils in England, this article shows how the pupils attending grammar schools are stratified…

This study sought to examine the extent of contribution of school feeding programmes towards the achievement of the Free Compulsory Universal Basic Education (FCUBE) policy in countries. Based on a purposive sampling of a deprived rural community in northern Ghana, the study utilised the concurrent mixed method design relying mainly on documentary…

The evaluation of the Premier League Reading Stars (PLRS) programme in 2013 has established that the intervention is having a positive impact on the attainment of participating children in reading and writing: Three out of four children made at least six months' progress in just ten weeks. One child in three made a year's progress or more. The…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the debate concerning community participation in school-based health education and health promotion, with regard to food and nutrition. Design/methodology/approach: Based on empirical data generated over the course of one year of fieldwork in three rural communities and schools in Ecuador, the…

Education and health care policies in Ghana since independence have been universalist in approach providing free universal health care and free basic and tertiary education until the early 1980s. Precipitated primarily by a severe drought, stagnant economic growth, mismanagement, and political instability, Ghana undertook major economic reforms…

Background: Existing evidence suggests a relationship between family social contexts, family relationships and interactions, children's social and cognitive development and educational outcomes. Interventions that assist families in relation to parenting and supporting children's development can have positive effects on both parents' skills and…

The young people who are the focus of this article grow up in communities ravaged by poverty and conflict. School is where they spend most of their time, but their experience of school is, generally, not motivating and increases their feelings of social exclusion; almost one in ten young people whose family depends on benefits leaves school with…

Relatively little research has explored whether schools differ in their effectiveness for different group of pupils (e.g. by ethnicity, poverty or gender), for different curriculum subjects (e.g. English, mathematics or science) or over time (different cohorts). This paper uses multilevel modelling to analyse the national test results at age 7 and…

One of the key tasks of schooling is to ensure that children become confident readers and writers, able to access the curriculum and to be prepared for the myriad of demands on their literacy skills in adult life. The aim of Every Child a Reader (ECAR) is to target those with reading difficulties (mostly living in poverty) and make sure that they…

Objective: To compare nutrient intake and indicators of nutritional status of western Kenyan pupil participants and nonparticipants of a parent-supported school lunch program. Design: Pupils and their caregivers were interviewed to assess their 24-hour dietary intake and the socioeconomic status of the family. Pupils' weights and heights were…

Data from interviews with 299 teachers in 46 English primary schools revealed that the correlation between free school meals and achievement and between free school meals and special educational needs may stem from teacher judgments. The very poorest schools with the lowest achievement have substantially higher levels of special needs identified…

Examined the association between free meal entitlement (FME) and the socioeconomic characteristics of schools in Scotland using a national survey of school leavers (n=8,545). Results suggest that FME is an inconsistent measure of poverty and only a partial proxy for socioeconomic circumstances. (SLD)