Report Overview
A cross-national study by the Sutton Trust of educational inequalities and their implications for future education and earnings mobility. This summary presents the key findings from the latest and most comprehensive multi-country study of educational inequalities and their implications for education and economic mobility.
Key Findings
- Gaps in school readiness in England between less advantaged children and their more advantaged counterparts are larger than those in similar nations such as Canada and Australia, but smaller than those in the United States.
- Formal preschool education can have lasting effects in reducing the educational and economic disparities between high and low income children.
- Disparities in early child outcomes persist into adolescence, with comparatively large attainment gaps observed in England.
- Unlike other countries, the achievement gap between less advantaged English children and their more advantaged counterparts widens between the ages of eleven (the end of primary school) and sixteen (end of compulsory secondary school).
- None of the countries included in the CRITA study provided evidence of reductions in childhood disparities by parental status as children age.