You are here:

The education of China's migrant children: The missing link in China's education system
ARTICLE

, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University, United States ; , , , Center for Chinese Agricultural Policy, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China ; , University of California, United States ; , , , Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University, United States

International Journal of Educational Development Volume 37, Number 1, ISSN 0738-0593 Publisher: Elsevier Ltd

Abstract

This paper examines the academic performance of migrant students in China and explores determinants of their performance. The paper compares academic performance, student backgrounds and measures of school quality between private schools attended only by migrant children in Beijing (Beijing migrant schools) and rural public schools in Shaanxi province. Furthermore, we employ multivariate regression to examine how individual characteristics and school quality affect migrant student performance and the achievement gap between migrant students and those in rural public schools. We find that although migrant students outperform students in Shaanxi's rural public schools when they initially arrive in Beijing, they gradually lose ground to rural students due to the poorer school resources and teacher quality in their schools. Additional analysis comparing migrant students in migrant schools to migrant students in Beijing public schools demonstrates that given access to better educational resources, migrant students may be able to significantly improve their performance.

Citation

Lai, F., Liu, C., Luo, R., Zhang, L., Ma, X., Bai, Y., Sharbono, B. & Rozelle, S. (2014). The education of China's migrant children: The missing link in China's education system. International Journal of Educational Development, 37(1), 68-77. Elsevier Ltd. Retrieved March 19, 2024 from .

This record was imported from International Journal of Educational Development on January 28, 2019. International Journal of Educational Development is a publication of Elsevier.

Full text is availabe on Science Direct: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2013.11.006

Keywords