Learning inequalities during the Covid-19 pandemic. A longitudinal analysis using the UK Understanding Society 2020 and 2021 data

Abstract

•The transition to distance schooling has exacerbated inequalities by socio-economic status (SES) due both to the gap in the volume of schoolwork completed and to the relative ability or inability of some parents to support their children’s learning.
•While parental occupation alone was found to be a significant determinant of differences in the volume of schoolwork among students, its effect was amplified when combined with student access to computers, family circumstances and parental working patterns.
•The provision of schoolwork improved in both primary and secondary schools in the second closure period (January 2021 through February 2021) compared to the first school closure period (from late March 2020 to the start of June 2020). The number of offline and online lessons per day increased and this led to a larger volume of schoolwork being done, from 2.3 hours per day to 3.3 hours per day in primary schools, and from 2.6 hours per day to 4 hours per day in secondary schools.
•The increase in schoolwork provision can be explained by the improved provision of lessons, by greater availability of computers and by the fact that families were better prepared for the second school closure and could engage more with the schoolwork provided.
•The results show that in January 2021 the gaps between ‘service class’ students (students whose parents are large employers, higher managers and professionals) and ‘routine class’ students (students whose parents are in routine and semi-routine sales, service, technical, agricultural and clerical occupations) reduced and became non-significant for primary school pupils. Service class and ‘intermediate class’ children (those whose parents are lower managerial, administrative and professional, small employers and own account workers) did not receive any more support from their parents than routine class children.
•Primary school children of single parents who worked from home were able to reduce the gap in schoolwork done compared to the most advantaged socio-economic group, but generally, inequalities between socio-economic groups in the uptake of schoolwork remained stable between the two school closure periods.

More information

Identifiers

ORCID for Nicola Pensiero: orcid.org/0000-0002-2823-9852

ORCID for Anthony Kelly: orcid.org/0000-0003-4664-8585

ORCID for Christian Bokhove: orcid.org/0000-0002-4860-8723

Catalogue record

Export record

Altmetrics