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AbstractThis paper discusses the research feasibility of Annual Status of Education Report (ASER), volunteering citizen‐led social survey conducted in Pakistan. The paper presents a detailed commentary on the process of ASER data collection, discussing the strengths, limitations and quality of the data maintained. There are also findings of the ASER data analysis from 2013 to 2016 with a focus on 34 risk factors associated with children's cognitive ability at age 8 (N = 89 460). The results show that 'not enrolled in school' and 'household poverty' are the biggest risk factors for children to achieve an expected level in learning. However, school type attended by children does not explain variation in the learning outcomes. Children missing information on household characteristics are at high risk of failing to achieve. Social surveys are feasible for understanding the patterns of household poverty and access to education. Following the discussion on results, the paper considers policy implications of maintaining a national database of all children, ensuring a universal access to school education in Pakistan. © 2019 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Longitudinal social surveys are widely used to understand which factors enable or constrain access to higher education. One such data resource is the Next Steps survey comprising an initial sample of 16,122 pupils aged 13-14 attending English state and private schools in 2004, with follow up annually to age 19-20 and a further survey at age 25. The Next Steps data is a potentially rich resource for studying inequalities of access to higher education. It contains a wealth of information about pupils' social background characteristics - including household income, parental education, parental social class, housing tenure and family composition - as well as longitudinal data on aspirations, choices and outcomes in relation to education. However, as with many longitudinal social surveys, Next Steps suffers from a substantial amount of missing data due to item non-response and sample attrition which may seriously compromise the reliability of research findings. Helpfully, Next Steps data has been linked with more robust administrative data from the National Pupil Database (NPD), which contains a more limited range of social background variables, but has comparatively little in the way of missing data due to item non-response or attrition. We analyse these linked datasets to assess the implications of missing data for the reliability of Next Steps. We show that item non-response in Next Steps biases the apparent socioeconomic composition of the Next Steps sample upwards, and that this bias is exacerbated by sample attrition since Next Steps participants from less advantaged social backgrounds are more likely to drop out of the study. Moreover, by the time it is possible to measure access to higher education, the socioeconomic background variables in Next Steps are shown to have very little explanatory power after controlling for the social background and educational attainment variables contained in the NPD. Given these findings, we argue that longitudinal social surveys with much missing data are only reliable sources of data on access to higher education if they can be linked effectively with more robust administrative data sources. This then raises the question - why not just use the more robust datasets?

Around the world, governments, charities, and other bodies are concerned with improving education, especially for the lowest-attaining and most disadvantaged students. Making Schools Better for Disadvantaged Students presents detailed research into how poverty affects student segregation and underachievement in schools. It contains the first ever large-scale evaluation of how funding can best be used to lower the poverty attainment gap for disadvantaged students. Drawing on a wealth of empirical research from England, India, and Pakistan as well as worldwide reviews of relevant studies, the book presents high-quality evidence on the impact of funding policy initiatives, such as the Pupil Premium funding in England, and the many variations of similar schemes worldwide. It analyses education measures which have been put in place and discusses ways in which these can be used efficiently and fairly to allocate funding to students who are persistently at risk of underachievement. The book is unique in synthesising many forms of evidence from around the world and finding a definition of educational disadvantage that can be used fairly across different contexts. Offering significant implications for ways to improve educational outcomes for disadvantaged students, the book will be essential reading for students of education policy, sociology of education and educational practices, and all researchers, school leaders, and policy-makers working in this area.

AbstractThrough analysis of primary qualitative data collected in Nineveh, Kirkuk, and Sulaimaniya Governorates in Iraq, this article seeks to explore the rapidly shifting and fragmenting identity dynamics at play in the emerging aftermath of ISIS and the impact that this conflict – and previous legacies of violence and repression – has had on relationships within and between groups, and between groups and the state. Communities increasingly position themselves against one another in relation to vindication of rights and protection. This zero‐sum stance comes from a history of mismanagement of communities and their respective grievances by the state and international partners. Formal acknowledgement of suffering across groups by the state may serve as a first step to break this cycle of negation toward one of inclusion, in the midst of mass displacement and emerging population returns.