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ERIC ED530082: When You Are Born Matters: The Impact of Date of Bir...
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The impact of date of birth on cognitive test scores is
well documented across many countries, with the youngest
children in each academic year performing more poorly, on
average, than the older members of their cohort (see, for
example, Bedard and Dhuey (2006) or Puhani and Weber
(2005)1). However, relatively little is known about the
driving forces behind these differences, at least in
England; nor does there appear to have been a robust
discussion regarding what, if anything, should be done in
light of these disparities. The authors address both of
these issues in this report. In England, the academic
year runs from 1 September to 31 August, so that a child
born on 31 August will start school (and sit exams) up to
a year earlier than a child born only one day later, on 1
September. Furthermore, as responsibility for determining
school admissions policies falls on local, rather than
central, authorities, there is considerable geographical
variation in terms of length of schooling (and the age at
which children start school) amongst the youngest members
of each cohort. In this report, the authors use this
framework to address four specific research questions:
(1) What is the extent of the August birth penalty across
different outcomes, and how does this vary by age (from
age 5 to age 18)?; (2) The authors then move on to
consider the impact of different school admissions
policies on the outcomes of August-born (as well as
January-, March- and May-born) children; (3) Observed
differences between the outcomes of August- and September-
born children could be due to a number of factors: (1)
Age of sitting the test (absolute age) effect; (2) Age of
starting school effect; (3) Length of schooling effect;
and (4) Age position (relative age) effect. Which of
these factors--absolute age, age of starting school,
length of schooling, age position--drive differences in
cognitive outcomes between August- and September-born
children?; and (4) Does the August birth penalty vary
across particular subgroups of interest? The authors use
administrative data on all children in state schools in
England to answer these questions. These data comprise
test results from the Foundation Stage (sat at age 5),
Key Stage 1 (age 7), Key Stage 2 (age 11), Key Stage 3
(age 14), Key Stage 4 (age 16) and Key Stage 5 (age 18),
plus some basic background characteristics collected via
an annual schools' census. The main results indicate that
there is evidence of a significant August birth penalty
in all outcomes and at every age for children in English
state schools. Findings suggest that admissions policies
do matter, at least for early cognitive outcomes. In
general, August-born children are slightly better off
(and certainly no worse off) if they start school in the
September of the academic year in which they turn 5
(rather than in the January or the April, as happens in
some local education authorities). Furthermore, this is
likely to be of greater benefit to girls than to boys.
The results suggest that the major reason why August-born
children perform significantly worse than September-born
children in the Key Stage tests is simply that they are
almost a year younger when they sit them. Whilst August-
born children do benefit from starting school earlier
rather than later (for example, in the September, rather
than the January or the April, of their reception year),
this makes only a modest positive contribution to test
scores and only at early Key Stages. Age position effects
are generally not important. Clearly, other policy
options are needed in order to eliminate the August birth
penalty. Whilst there are some significant differences in
terms of the magnitude of the August birth penalty for
children who are and are not eligible for free school
meals (discussed in Chapter 8), perhaps the most
important finding is the lack of significant differences
amongst the majority of subgroups considered. This
suggests that, in most cases, August-born children,
regardless of observable characteristics, face the same
disadvantage (in terms of cognitive outcomes) relative to
September-born children. This suggests that policy
options do not need to be tailored to the needs of
particular subgroups: in theory, all August-born children
should benefit from the suggestions that the authors
make. Additional tables and figure are appended.
(Contains 6 figures, 46 tables and 118 footnotes.)
Date Published: 2016-02-16 23:00:27
Identifier: ERIC_ED530082
Item Size: 71713927
Language: english
Media Type: texts
# Topics
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