This paper re-considers the widespread use of value-added approaches to estimate school ‘effects’, and shows the results to be very unstable over time. The paper uses as an example the contextualised value-added scores of all secondary schools in England. The study asks how many schools with at least 99% of their pupils included in the VA calculations, and with data for all years, had VA measures that were clearly positive for five years. The answer is - none. Whatever it is that VA is measuring, if it is measuring anything at all, it is not a consistent characteristic of schools. To find no schools with five successive years of positive VA means that parents could not use it as a way of judging how well their primary age children would do at age 16 in their future secondary school. Contextualised value-added (CVA) is used here for the calculations because there is good data covering five years that allows judgement of its consistency as a purported school characteristic. However, what is true of CVA is almost certainly true of VA approaches more generally, whether for schools, colleges, departments or individual teachers, in England and everywhere else. Until their problems have been resolved by further development to handle missing and erroneous data, value-added models should not be used in practice. Commentators, policy-makers, educators and families need to be warned. If value-added scores are as meaningless as they appear to be, there is a serious ethical issue wherever they have been or continue to be used to reward and punish schools or make policy decisions

Undergraduate experiences of the research / teaching nexus across the whole student lifecycle. Teaching in Higher Education.

This paper continues an ongoing investigation of the social and economic 'segregation' of students between schools in England, and of the likely causes of the levels of and changes over time in that segregation. The data presented here come from a re-analysis of the intakes to all schools in England 1989-2011 as portrayed by the official returns to the Annual Schools Census. Using a segregation index it shows how strongly clustered the students are in particular schools in terms of six indicators of potential disadvantagerepresenting poverty, learning difficulties, first language and ethnicity. It shows again, and with further years than previously, that each indicator has its own level and pattern of change over time. This suggests that there is not just one process of segregation. However, the patterns for primary-age schools (5-10) are exactly the same for most indicators as the patterns for secondary-age schools (11-18). These two findings in combination rule out a large number of potential explanations either for changes in or levels of segregation-including volatility of small numbers, and recent changes in the types of schools and in the ways in which school places are allocated. Instead, based on correlations with other indicators of population, school numbers, and the economy, a new set of determinants are proposed. The long-term underlying level of segregation appears to be the outcome of structural and geographic factors. However, the annual changes in segregation for most indicators can be explained most simply by changes in the prevalence of each indicator. For example, the UK policy of inclusion has considerably increased the number of students with statements of special needs in mainstream schools, and this has resulted, intentionally, in less segregation in terms of this indicator. Segregation by poverty, however, requires something further to explain changes over time, and this is provided at least partly by changes in GDP over time, and partly as a one-off impact of increased parental choice. Some of these factors, such as the global economy or the prevalence of specific ethnic minority groups, are not directly under policy-makers' control. This means that it is the more malleable factors leading to the underlying levels of poverty segregation that should be addressed by any state wanting a fair and mixed national school system. In England, these controllable factors include the use of proximity to decide contested places at schools, and the continued existence of faith-based and selective schools. The implications are spelt out. This paper considers the pupil intakes to Academies in England, and their attainment, based on a re-analysis of figures from the Annual Schools Census 1989 to 2012, the Department for Education School Performance Tables 2004 to 2012, and the National Pupil Database. It looks at the national picture, and the situation for local education authorities, and also examines in more detail the trajectories of the three original Academies. It confirms earlier studies in finding ...

This paper explores how the various pressures of finance, employability, and part-time work are experienced by undergraduates studying in a Northern Red Brick University. Drawing on the results of a three-year qualitative study that followed 40 students throughout their three years of studies (n =40, n =40, n =38, ntotal=118), the paper details three dimensions by which students understood their part-time employment experiences: the characteristics of employment types; motivations for employment; and, the challenges of shaping their employment experiences around their studies. It is argued that the current shortfalls in the student budget and the pressures of the employability agenda may actually serve to further disadvantage the lower income groups in the form a 'double deficit'. Not only are discrepancies between income and expenditure likely to mean that additional monies are necessary to study for a degree, the resulting need for part-time employment is also likely to constrain both degree outcome and capacity to enhance skills necessary for 'employability'.

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