This ongoing study of school intakes in England looks at the educational opportunities and outcomes for children and young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. ‘Disadvantage’ here is defined in terms of living-in-care/fostered children, eligibility for free school meals (FSM) or pupil premium, and living in poorer areas. The foundations of the research are the official records for all students at school in England over their 11 years of compulsory schooling, and over 30 years of history. Previous work has shown how there are different determinants for the level of segregation at any time, from the determinants of longer-term changes in segregation over time, in a system of parental choice (e.g. Gorard 2015). The research questions from this newer project include: 1) What is the pattern of pupil FSM and other disadvantaged ‘trajectories’ over their school careers? 2) What difference does including pupil FSM and other disadvantaged trajectories make to the apparent patterns of segregation between school intakes? 3) What are the patterns of attainment of pupils with different trajectories? 4) What difference does including the FSM and other disadvantaged trajectories make to school average progress scores? Using National Pupil Database data from four age cohorts and tracking them from entering the school system until Key Stage 4 at age 16 and beyond, we have identified a number of histories/patterns of FSM-eligibility for pupils. The resulting trajectories have been cross-referenced with everything else known about the individuals – including background characteristics such as ethnicity or first language, plus school history, local geography, and their prior and subsequent attainment. It is clear that pupils known to be eligible for FSM for every year at school are much more disadvantaged even than those for whom FSM is a temporary phase. Other indicators of disadvantage grow with every year of FSM while attainment and progress at school decreases. The study also takes all missing data seriously, presenting what we otherwise know about students missing key data items. This has implications for existing published patterns of FSM (and other) segregation between schools, and the finer grained composite variables created, including the FSM trajectories, are used as explanatory variables in assessing pupil attainment and progress scores at school. This changes our understanding of differential school effectiveness, and the early results have already been used in Parliament to assist the debate over whether increasing selection will also increase standards and social mobility, and whether there is a North:South divide.

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