Social Diversity in Middle Schools
This unprecedented study in France aims to extend the evidence on the effects of social diversity in school to non-cognitive skill development.
Since 2015 the Ministry of National Education is engaged in an innovative experimental approach based on the proposals and the work in tandem with the local actors to develop social and educational diversity in middle schools. An independent scientific evaluation of the program is currently being performed by a team of economists made up of Yann Algan, Ghazala Azmat, Axelle Charpentier, Elise Huillery (Co-director of the Educational policies research project - LIEPP) and Julien Grenet. It will measure the impact of social diversity at school on pupils’ educational and social skills.
Policy issues
The international scientific literature suggests that diversity has a rather reduced positive effect on the students’ school performance (see for example, Gibbons & Telhaj 2015). This effect is not symmetric (see for example, Hoxby 2000, Angrist & Lang 2004, Guyon et al. 2012). Pupils who underperformed or coming from underprivileged areas can take advantage of the presence of better students or students coming from more privileged families. However, pupils coming from privileged areas are not put at a disadvantage by the fact that they are educated with either less performing pupils or pupils coming from less privileged areas.
Nevertheless, the studies in question did not highlight the effects pertaining to the educational context whenever a shock concerning the social composition of the school turned out to be influential (in terms of change in distribution with regard either to the educational level or to the educational environment). Besides, there are only a few reliable quantitative studies available highlighting results concerning data relating to France. Finally, the inventoried studies focus most of the time on school performance and measure relatively short-term effects. This means that they do not take the non-cognitive channel into consideration through which the possibly involved peer effects might play a role, be they social skills, aspirations or pupils’ well-being.
Research goals
The research protocol aims at observing the effects of diversity on the school context and on the development of pupils’ cognitive and non-cognitive skills through the course of their schooling in middle schools (6th to 9th grade). The evaluation protocol is built upon two main issues. The first researchers’ objective is to determine the approach’s impact on the social and educational composition of the middle schools in which changes in the distribution of students took place. Some families may implement circumvention strategies, thereby nullifying the efforts made in terms of social diversity. That is the reason why we have to measure to what extent the peers of the pupils change in accordance with the implementation of the experimentations. The evaluation of the social and educational composition will be extended to the surrounding schools likely to have been indirectly affected by the approach.
The second objective is to emphasize the impact of social diversity on pupils’ learning process, on their non-cognitive and social skills and on their well-being. The outcome indicators will include the students’ behaviour, the self-perceived school climate, the way pupils feel about social distinction, the way they view merit, their ambitions and their self-esteem. The pupils’ follow-up will take place until the end of middle school so as to evaluate the approach’s impact on the general certificate of secondary education and the pupils’ educational guidance in high school.
Methodology
To do so, the researchers will compare the middle schools participating in the approach designed to foster social diversity with similar establishments not participating in the approach. This comparison makes it possible to identify the benefits associated with diversity in middle schools in so far as the participating and the non-participating middle schools can be compared from the start, that is to say before the measures designed to foster social diversity have been implemented.
Research group recent events
- 6th edition of the workshop ‘Experimental research on social inequalities’
- L'impact des outils numériques sur les apprentissages des élèves - Évaluation du Plan numérique de 2015
- LIEPP seminar: "Les compétences prédictives de la réussite scolaire et du bien-être des enfants"
See all events from this Research Group
Publications of the Research Group
- Agnès VAN ZANTEN, Amelia LEGAVRE, Engineering access to higher education through higher education fairs- LIEPP Working Paper, n° 22, April 2014
- Nina GUYON, Elise HUILLERY, Choix d’orientation et origine sociale : mesurer et comprendre l’autocensure scolaire LIEPP Report décembre 2014
- Agnès VAN ZANTEN, Alice OLIVIER, Les stratégies statutaires des établissements d’enseignement supérieur. Une étude des « journées portes ouvertes » , LIEPP Working Paper n°40, novembre 2015
- Yann ALGAN, Elise HUILLERY, Nina GUYON, Comment lutter contre la violence et le harcèlement à l'école et au collège ? LIEPP Policy Brief n°19, juin 2015
- Laura Perna, Improving Higher Education of All Students: Lessons from the United States , LIEPP Working Paper n°48, February 2016
- Nina GUYON, Elise HUILLERY, Biased Aspirations and Social Inequality at School: Evidence from French Teenagers , LIEPP Working Paper, n°44, January 2016
- Nina GUYON, Elise HUILLERY, Track choice and socioeconomic origin: measuring and explaining academic inhibition , LIEPP Policy Brief n°23, february 2016
- Carlo BARONE, Antonio SCHIZZEROTTO, Giovanni Maria ABBIATI, Giulia ASSIRELLI, Gender, information barriers and fields of study choice: a field experiment , LIEPP Working Paper, n°63, January 2017
- Carlo BARONE, Denis FOUGERE, Clément PIN, La lecture partagée: un levier pour réduire les inégalités scolaires? LIEPP Policy Brief n°44, septembre 2019
- Carlo BARONE, Denis FOUGERE, Clément PIN, Social origins, shared book reading and language skills in early childhood LIEPP Working Paper n°93, octobre 2019
- Clément PIN, Evaluation du Plan de simplification pour l'enseignement supérieur et la recherche LIEPP Report octobre 2019
- Giulia ASSIRELLI, Carlo BARONE, Emilio Chambouleyron, Reka Vonnak Shared Book Reading Interventions and Children's Skills LIEPP Working Paper n°98, december 2019
- Giulia ASSIRELLI, Carlo BARONE, Emilio Chambouleyron, Reka Vonnak Shared Book Reading Interventions and Children's Skills LIEPP Working Paper n°98, december 2019
- Jérôme AUST, Ulrike LEPONT, Les LABEX réinventés les appropriations paradoxales d'un instrument d'action publique en biologie LIEPP Policy Brief, n°42, Juin 2019
- Béatrice BOUTCHENIK, Pauline GIVORD, Olivier MONSO, How do restrictive zoning and parental choices impact social diversity in schools? LIEPP Working Paper n°105, February 2020
- Laudine CARBUCCIA , Interventions to foster academic aspirations adjustment among disadvantaged and female students - A PRISMA systematic review of literature , LIEPP Working Paper n°114, Novembre 2020
- Clément PIN, Évaluation d'un plan national de simplification administrative. Le cas de l'enseignement supérieur et de la recherche LIEPP Policy Brief n°50, Mars 2021
- Marco OBERTI, Mathieu ROSSIGNOL-BRUNET, Elise TENRET, Pauline BARRAUD DE LAGERIE, Yannick SAVINA Reconfiguration du champ des formations en sciences humaines en Île-de-France : le poids de la sélection LIEPP Working Paper n°121, Juin 2021
- Pauline GIVORD, How age at school entry affects future educational and socioemotional outcomes: Evidence from PISA. LIEPP Working Paper n°120, Mai 2021
- Pauline GIVORD, Qu'est-ce qu'un bon lycée ? Questions de mesure LIEPP Policy Brief n°54, octobre 2021
- Bastian BETTHAUSER, Anders BACH-MORTENSEN, Per ENGZELL, A systematic review and meta-analysis of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on learning LIEPP Working Paper n°134, May 2022
- Pauline GIVORD, Francesco AVVISATI The learning gain over one school year among 15-year-olds: An international comparison based on PISA Sciences Po LIEPP Working paper, July, 2022
- Laudine CARBUCCIA, Carlo BARONE, Coralie CHEVALLIER, Valentin THOUZEAU Unequal access to early childcare : What role do demand-side factors play ? A PRISMA systematic review LIEPP Working Paper n°138, 2023
- Olivier MONSO, Audrey FARGES Fréquenter l'internat à l'entrée du lycée a-t-il un impact sur la réussite scolaire ? Une évaluation sur les lycées publics de l'Éducation nationale LIEPP Working Paper n°141, 2023