The disadvantage gap has widened across all phases of education since before the pandemic, researchers have found.
After analysing 2022 attainment data for the second phase of its 2023 report, the Education Policy Institute (EPI) has found the disadvantage gap at the end of 16-19 study is the widest it has recorded since 2017.
At 16-19, disadvantaged students were 3.5 grades behind their more advantaged peers across their best three subjects in 2022. For persistently disadvantaged students, that gap widened to 4.5 grades.
Sam Tuckett, EPI associate director for post-16, said: “These findings show that the government must take bolder steps to tackle widening inequalities in post-16 education. These should include a new ‘student premium’, like the pupil premium available in secondary school, to support the most disadvantaged students.”
Association of School and College Leaders general secretary Geoff Barton said: “The widening of the disadvantage gap is desperately sad but not unexpected. We and others repeatedly warned that the impact of the pandemic was uneven and that disadvantaged children were falling further behind.
“But ministers failed to respond with an education recovery plan on the scale that was necessary to meet this challenge.”
The second phase of the EPI’s annual report particularly looked at attainment gaps at 16-19 by gender, geography and for students with English as an additional language (EAL).
This report adds to their first phase report in October that found the attainment gap for five-year-olds with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) support was at its highest ever.
The new phase of the report found there has been some progress in closing the SEND gap at 16-19 since before the pandemic, from 5.2 grades to 5 grades.
Here are the key findings in the report.
Regional inequalities remain
Disadvantaged pupils in London tended to have higher attainment in 2022 than disadvantaged pupils in the rest of the country.
At a regional level, the widest gaps for pupils aged five were in the North West (5.6 months), in the South West at age 11 (12.2 months), and the South East at age 16 (21.8 months). Blackpool, Kingston-upon-Hull and Torbay in particular saw some of the widest gaps at the end of secondary school.
EPI researchers said there are some signs the government’s opportunity areas (OAs) may be helping educational outcomes, particularly across primary. The OAs were part of a five-year scheme to improve social mobility through education in 12 areas - the OAs have since become priority education investment areas.
The EPI recommended that the government publish an evaluation of the impact OAs had, which could be used to inform future localised education initiatives.
EPI chief executive Natalie Perera said: “This report serves as a warning to all political parties that education and tackling inequalities must be a priority as we head towards a general election.”
Girls ahead at every phase
Girls were ahead of boys across all educational phases in 2022, the EPI found.
The gap was narrower at the end of primary school than in Reception before widening again at secondary. By the end of key stage 2, girls were 5.5 months ahead in reading and boys two months ahead in maths.
Girls were found to be five months ahead of boys at GCSE across English and maths in 2022 - this is the narrowest gender gap that EPI has found since 2011. That gap is mostly driven by girls being nearly 10 months ahead in English with a more negligible gap for maths, which the EPI said showed girls tended to catch up with boys in maths at secondary.
The EPI recommended that the Department for Education look to other countries for approaches to help narrow gender gaps.
Later arrivals face ‘significant attainment penalty’
Researchers found that pupils who arrived late to the English school system with English as an additional language (EAL) incurred “a significant attainment penalty”.
Those with EAL arriving late to school in England were 11.6 months behind their classmates by the end of primary in 2022.
That gap widened to 16.6 months by the end of secondary.
However, this gap has reduced since 2019. Researchers said the narrowing gap reflects the EAL group shifting towards “historically high-attaining ethnic groups and away from low-attaining ones”.
The EPI recommended the introduction of a late arrival premium for these EAL pupils to narrow the attainment gap, and also improve data collection on EAL pupils so that attainment can be tracked based on time of arrival, first language, ethnicity and English proficiency.
Reaction: situation is ‘worsening’
Education Endowment Foundation CEO Professor Becky Francis and National Education Union general secretary Daniel Kebede both said the findings on the state of educational inequality also show the impact of increasing poverty outside of the classroom.
Mr Kebede warned that the findings showed the situation for disadvantaged students is “worsening”.
Professor Francis added that, for disadvantaged pupils “every second spent in the classroom in front of a teacher matters. This is why recruiting and retaining staff must be front and centre of any national efforts to tackle the gap.”
A Department for Education spokesperson said: ”Despite the impact of the pandemic, we are taking the long-term decisions to improve our education system for generations to come, including the new Advanced British Standard (ABS) which will see every student in England study some form of maths and English to age 18.”
The spokesperson highlighted how earlier this month England was ranked 11th in the world for maths, up from 27th in 2009.
They added: “We have made £5 billion available since 2020 for education recovery initiatives, with almost half of pupils receiving tutoring up until January 2023 having been in receipt of free school meals, meaning tutoring is reaching some of the most disadvantaged children in the country.”
