ABSTRACT
This chapter makes an international comparison of parents’ occupation, education level and family economic status (property and educational resources), and comprehensively analyzes the influence of this index on students’ performance through the use of the questions that constitute the ESCS index. PISA has constructed an ESCS index combining information of parents’ occupation, education level, family property and educational resources. One of PISA’s outstanding contributions to the educational research is that it has proven the significant influence of students’ family background on their academic performance by evidence. Although most practitioners and researchers of vocational education agree that the families of vocational school students are in a relatively inferior position in socioeconomic stratification, this chapter explores how big is the gap from non-vocational school students in China? If occupation is regarded as the basis of social stratification, how much influence does the occupational status of their parents have on their choosing vocational education in China? These conclusions or specific issues need to be supported by sufficient data.
