six - The impact of poverty on children’s school attendance – evidence from West Germany

Summary

Introduction: childhood poverty and school attendance

Over the last decades most Western industrialised countries have experienced a considerable change concerning the economic situation and relative income position of the old and the young. While the situation of older people significantly improved in quite a few of those countries, the well-being of children appears to have got worse (Cornia, 1997; Habich and Krause, 1997; Burniaux et al, 1998; Bradbury and Jäntti, 1999; Bradshaw, 1999). On the other hand, educational opportunities for children in general have improved in most OECD countries (OECD, 1998). This leads to the expectation of increasing differences in educational prospects. The question of whether income inequality and poverty do affect educational attainment remains therefore a most crucial one in educational research.

Attending school is important for two reasons. First and most obviously, school helps children to acquire learning skills and information on a wide range of subjects. Second, and in many ways just as important, formal schooling provides the forum through which children develop social skills, learning to be independent and to relate to non-family members in a group-based setting. This latter reason is particularly important for children who may be underprivileged or deprived, where school may enrich or compensate for the other areas of their life which are lacking, and may provide a constancy of environment not found at home. (Rushton, 1995, p 94, cited in Howarth et al, 1998, p 50)

Existing literature (Gregg and Machin, 1998; Hobcraft, 1998) reveals severe disadvantages for children growing up in poverty with regard to their educational prospects. This chapter contributes, with German data, a special focus for measuring the income situation of children and thereby provides a more differentiated picture than gained with traditional research designs.

Although poverty rates among children in Germany appear less dramatic when compared to other countries (especially the US), the link between poverty and school attendance needs to be carefully investigated. This seems to be true in general for countries with relatively low child poverty rates where one could hypothesise that the educational prospects of children are negatively influenced by a low family income. However, a counter hypothesis would be that a relatively small variation in socioeconomic background is accompanied by relatively equal educational prospects for children.