Using materials from Item A and elsewhere, assess the strengths and limitations of official statistics for the study of ethnicity and educational achievement

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Fady Philip

“Using materials from Item A and elsewhere, assess the strengths and limitations of official statistics for the study of ethnicity and educational achievement”

Official statistics are one of the many secondary sources of data and it can simply be defined as information collected from the general public by government agencies or private organisations, usually through a census or a survey. Statistical data rounded in official statistics is mainly used for the study of demography, education, inflation, crime and deviance, unemployment, poverty and suicide. In terms of theoretical perspective, official statistics are preferred by positivists. There are, as to any research method, strengths and limitations.

Practically speaking, one strength would be the fact that there are huge amounts of quantitative data available by the government. For example, the government collects statistics on over 30,000 primary and 4,000 secondary schools in England and Wales. In practice, it would be too costly and time-consuming for a sociologist to gather information on so many schools themselves. Sociologists can use official statistics without having to pay for it because it saves them time and money. In addition, anyone who is able to use the internet or go to a library can access the information irrespective of their age/generation, class, gender or ethnicity. However, the limitation is that governments collect statistics for their own purposes and these may not be the same as those of sociologists. For example, sociologists are very interested in the relationship between ethnicity and educational achievement, but there are no available statistics on this. In addition, even where the state collects educational statistics of sociological interest, the definitions of key concepts may differ from those that sociologists use. For example, official definitions of pupils social class are based on parental occupation, whereas Marxist sociologists define class in terms of property ownership. All these would be practical issues for the sociologist. In spite of the limitations, on a practical level, a vast array of statistical data is readily available for most topics that sociologists may be interested in on education. However, it is fair to say that most sociologists will use official statistics in conjunction with data collected from other methods and this ensures that the pattern is identified and explained.

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Another strength would be that statistics provide comparisons between groups such as ethnic or gender groups on the same topics. Also, because educational statistics are collected at regular and frequent intervals, sociologists can make comparisons over time. For example, annually gathered exam statistics enable the sociologist to see trends in results. Sociologists can then analyse cause and effect relationships. However, the limitation is that governments may change the definitions and categories. For example, when the Conservatives first introduced league tables of school performance in 1988, a school’s position was based purely on its exam results. This generally meant that ...

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