Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Dr Tammy Campbell's Seminar - CEPEO Seminar Series. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar.

Please note that this seminar is online only due to the industrial action on the rail network. Who defers and delays entry to primary school? Evidence from the English National Pupil Database Within the ‘normal’ school year-group cohort, summer-born children are proportionally much younger than autumn-borns at the usual point of school entry. Since 2014, families’ right to request later entry, particularly for summer-borns, has been enshrined in national guidance. Deferred entry may benefit certain children – potentially including some who were born premature and some who have ‘special educational needs’ and/or disabilities (SEND). However, the ‘right to request’ might also exacerbate inequalities, if more ‘advantaged’ families tend to access it. Existing evidence on patterns of entry is not nationally representative, probably contains biased responses, and does not consider the interaction between child-level factors and family circumstances. Among children who may plausibly be better served by education with the cohort below, are those who are from ‘advantaged’ families more likely to follow this pathway? I use the National Pupil Database to fill gaps and build a comprehensive sense of patterns of school entry over the past decade, focussing on family income-level and home language, and children’s SEND. I describe relationships between these family and child-level factors, and disparities by Local Authority. I discuss implications for the success, or otherwise, and continued implementation of the ‘right to request’ later school entry. UCL's General Privacy Notice: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/legal-services/privacy/general-privacy-notice