This study examined the effects of family SES on children's mathematics achievement for urban, rural, and migrant families in China. The data comprised 6050 children (44% female, 56% male) in grades 4 and 5 from a national database in China. The results showed that parental education level and family income were directly related to children's…

Among all children under 18 years in the U.S., 43 percent live in low-income families and 21 percent--approximately one in five--lives in a poor family. This means that children are overrepresented among our nation's poor; they represent 23 percent of the population but comprise 33 percent of all people in poverty. Many more children live in…

Higher education has experienced many changes since the 1970s, including an increase in the price of college, an increase in student employment during college, a decrease in college completion rates, and an increase in time to degree. This paper ties these trends together by causally linking changes in financial aid with time to degree and student…

Spiraling costs and lack of understanding of how to manage those costs lead many students to never enroll, or drop out before completing their degrees. While state and federal funding can help to offset college costs, low-income students often are unaware that institutional aid can significantly lower costs and in some cases make college…

College can seem out of reach for many low-income students. Too often they believe college is unaffordable and unattainable. It is no surprise then that students from the bottom socioeconomic quartile are eight times less likely to earn a bachelor's degree than students from the top socioeconomic quartile (7.4% versus 60%). Colleges and…

The Big Lift is a collective impact initiative extending from preschool to third-grade in San Mateo County, California. The initiative is a partnership of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, the San Mateo County Office of Education, and the County of San Mateo. Launched in 2012, the initiative aims to boost children's reading proficiency in…

COVID-19 has brought chaotic change to early education. Most of the nation's 5 million 3- to 5-year-olds attending preschool classrooms had their attendance cut short in March 2020. Preschool-age children in family day care or at home with parents and other family members had their daily routines disrupted. Parents now often work from home and…

Studies in social stratification have used siblings as a tool to learn about the intergenerational transmission of advantage but less often have asked how siblings impact one another's life chances. The author draws on social capital theory and hypothesizes that when youths attend college, they increase the probability that their siblings attend…

The Tuition Opportunity Program for Students (subsequently renamed the Taylor Opportunity Program for Students, also known as TOPS) was created by Act 1375 of the 1997 Regular Legislative Session. The first college freshman class to receive TOPS awards entered postsecondary education in the fall of 1998. Act 1202 of the 2001 Regular Legislative…

In Maryland, one way children's wellbeing is measured is by looking at the data from the Kindergarten Readiness Assessment (KRA). While the data can illustrate how children perform on various indicators across literacy, math, social-emotional development and physical well-being, it's really a reflection of the "readiness" of Maryland…

This article draws upon the literature showing the benefits of high-quality preschools on child well-being to explore the role of household income on preschool attendance for a cohort of 3-to 6-year-olds in China using data from the China Health and Nutrition Survey, 1991-2006. Analyses are conducted separately for rural (N = 1,791) and urban…

Parents and students from different socioeconomic backgrounds value differently school characteristics, but the reasons behind this preference heterogeneity are not well understood. In the context of the centralized school assignment system in Mexico City, this study analyzes how a large household income shock affects choices over high school…

The 34th edition of the Annie E. Casey Foundation's KIDS COUNT® Data Book describes how the country's lack of affordable and accessible child care negatively affects children, families and U.S. businesses. This year's publication continues to present national and state data across four domains--economic well-being, education, health and family and…

We examine the effect of the expansion of charter schools on socioeconomic segregation in American public education. Using a district-level panel data set from 1998 to 2015, we describe and model changes in within-district segregation of low-income students, proxied by free-lunch eligibility (FLE). We show that the segregation of FLE students from…

Nebraska is committed to measuring its progress toward achieving the major statewide goals through national comparisons and institutional peer comparisons. It is the aim of the "Comprehensive Plan" that, when rank order is appropriate, Nebraska will rank among the ten best states in national comparisons, and individual public…