School achievement and immigration in Catalonia, 2011-2016: a demo-spatial analysis

Abstract

In this paper we present a study of schoolchildren of immigrant origin from the “generational” perspective, with the primary aim of visualising and re-evaluating the different situations relating to immigration and the secondary aim of analysing school achievement in relation to the determinants of the migratory process. The results indicate that major changes are occurring in the composition by origin of the student body, in which the presence of second generations is increasingly significant. At the same time, school failure is explained to a large degree by students’ recent arrival in Catalonia or by immigration-related discontinuities of their presence in our country, in some cases in proportions that are considerably higher than the figures for students defined as autochthonous. This approach, which offers a better understanding of the composition of the student body in classrooms, has not previously been possible owing to a lack of statistical data and it is also a good example of the possibilities of analysis offered by crossing data from administrative records and population statistics. These operations are indispensable for any project aimed to design more effective school integration policies and, consequently, to contribute to social cohesion in the medium and long terms.

Keywords: Immigration, school, migratory status, school failure, demography.