ABSTRACT
The picture of United Kingdom education systems that emerged from the OECD study of social disadvantage and educational outcomes (OECD, 2006) was a bleak one. The study reported that in the United Kingdom socio-economic circumstances had a greater influence on educational attainment than almost anywhere in the world, with both England and Scotland ranking in the bottom five of the 52 countries surveyed. This despite the fact that the last 20 years have seen successive governments impose policy upon policy, in deliberate and focused attempts to bring about improvements in the quality and performance of individual schools in England, particularly those serving disadvantaged communities. It would seem that the efforts to create a more equitable educational system in which educational policies offset key aspects of socio-economic disadvantage that hold back educational attainment have had little impact. England remains a place where social differences are likely to be magnified rather than eliminated through schooling, a place where privileged home circumstances seem more important than schooling in determining the life chances available to young people.
