Den här uppsatsen undersöker om studieprestationen hos studenter med olika socioekonomisk bakgrund påverkas olika av förändringar i nivån på studiemedlet. Vi gör detta genom att använda oss av en serie reformer av det svenska studiemedelssystemet som ändrade incitamenten för studenter att spendera sin tid på arbete eller studier. Aggregerad socioekonomisk bakgrund på lärosätesnivå används för att uppskatta skillnaderna mellan de socioekonomiska grupperna, där lärosäten med en högre andel studenter med stark socioekonomisk bakgrund antas vara mindre beroende av arbetsinkomster och därmed mindre känsliga för förändringar i studiemedlet. Utvecklingen i prestationsgrad för de socioekonomiska grupperna jämförs före och efter reformerna med hjälp av en difference-in-difference regression. Sammantaget ger resultaten stöd för att de socioekonomiska grupperna inte skiljer sig åt i hur deras prestationer i högskolan påverkades av reformerna. / This thesis explores if the academic achievements of students with different socioeconomic backgrounds are affected differently when the level of student aid is changed. We do this by using a series of reforms in the Swedish student aid system that changed incentives for students to spend time working or studying. Aggregate socioeconomic background for universities was used to estimate the differences between socioeconomic groups, where universities with a higher share of students with a strong socioeconomic background are assumed to be less dependent on work-related sources of income and thus less sensitive to changes in the level of student aid. The development of achievement rates in the socioeconomic groups were compared before and after the reforms took place by using a difference-in-differences regression. Overall, the results indicate that the socioeconomic groups do not differ in terms of how their achievements in higher education were affected by the reforms

This thesis will apply a theory consuming method studying voter turnout between swing states in the United States. To accomplish the theory consuming study, the study is divided into two phases. It will start testing Downs’ rational choice theory and apply this to voter turnout. It will then move on to applying the independent variables, socioeconomic background and voting laws to understand voter turnout from this perspective. The study starts with the hypothesis that Downs’ rational choice theory should be able to explain swing states’ voter participation. However, the research shows rational choice theory cannot explain the voter turnout in swing states. In the second phase, the study tests socioeconomic background and voting laws. These two independent variables better explain the voter turnout in swing states. Being well educated while being well off financially have a bigger impact than what rational choice theory can explain. It does not matter if P is overestimated and C is almost nil, it did not help to explain the voter difference in swing states, even though according to the theory, swing states should vote accordingly. To be able to increase voter turnout in swing states with a low voter turnout, not only does voting laws have to become more liberal, but one law in particular seems to make the biggest difference: the possibility to register on election day. However, changing voting laws are not enough. The largest impact is your socioeconomic background. A high educational attainment and being financially stable over the poverty level are the core reasons for voter turnout. Taking people out of poverty and creating opportunities for all to attend college is where higher voter turnout starts.

This study aims to give an overview of school segregation in Stockholm and its development during the period 2000 to 2010. Further, it aims to examine the effects of school segregation on student achievement. The first part of the study uses register data to measure segregation in schools from 2000 to 2010, the second part utilizes the Stockholm School Survey 2010 for measuring student demographics and school achievement. The examination of school segregation in Stockholm reveal a substantial segregation between schools, on both levels of non-native background and parental education. The trends have been stable for segregation on non-native background and decreased slightly for parental education from 2000 to 2010, however, they both remain at relatively high levels. Multilevel analysis show that student school achievement is negatively impacted by increased concentration of students with disadvantaged characteristics, i.e. higher levels of students with non-native background and lower levels of parental education. The results also indicate that non-native students are more negatively affected by these effects. Further, the analysis tests for threshold effects of segregation, but no such effects can be identified and it seems to be more or less linear, higher degree of segregation leads to stronger effects. It is concluded that differences between schools have an unequal and unfair effect on student school achievement.

I denna kunskapsöversikt har vi undersökt vilka möjligheter och hinder som finns med läsläxa. Läsläxor tycks vara ett självklart verktyg att använda sig av i undervisningen för att främja goda akademiska resultat samtidigt som effekten av dem och rättvisan med läxor diskuterats friskt i samhället och media under de senaste åren. För att undersöka hur möjligheter och hinder med användandet av läsläxa skrivs fram i befintlig forskning skapade vi söksträngar baserade på ord vi ansåg vara relevanta för vår frågeställning. Då sökningen inte gav några relevanta träffar på svenska i den svenska databasen SwePub använde vi oss därefter uteslutande av engelska översättningar av orden i våra söksträngar och enbart av databasen ERIC. Totalt har nio forskningsartiklar valts ut i sökningen som relevant forskning för att besvara vår frågeställning, i vilka tre teman kunde urskiljas. För att kunna urskilja dessa teman har vi använt oss av tematisk analysmetod i enlighet med beskrivningen av Braun och Clarke (2008), där vi genom kodning har hittat återkommande nyckelord i artiklarna för att se likheter och mönster. Resultaten är något motstridiga men mycket tyder på att läsläxa har relativt liten akademisk effekt. Dock visar forskningen även att läsläxan kan ha en positiv effekt på både elevers läslust och motivation. Resultaten lyfter också betydelsen av rätt slags stöd från vuxna i elevernas omgivning. Med rätt stöd i detta avseende menas att barnen får hjälp med struktur och uppmuntran samt att förväntansbilden av dem är hög men rimlig. Kontroll, strikta krav, icke-engagemang och orimliga förväntningar har däremot motsatt effekt. I diskussionen lyfter vi frågan om hur läsning kan få mer utrymme i undervisningen i skolan för att eventuellt undvika just fenomenet läsläxa. Vi diskuterar även den demokratiska aspekten kring användandet av läsläxa och huruvida det verkligen är rättvist att använda det som ett verktyg i undervisningen. Vidare lyfter vi de uppfattningar vi fått kring stöttning om läsläxor delas ut till barnen och avslutar med tankar och förslag kring framtida forskning. Vi berör återkommande även hur det påverkar läraryrket om man väljer att ge läsläxa.

In recent years several municipalities in Sweden have merged their public secondary schools. This has been considered a type of initiative that intends to reduce youth segregation and discrepancies in school quality. This thesis examines in what ways the merging of all public secondary schools in a municipality affects the students’ academic performance and their choice to enroll in the publicschool sector. To do so I use municipality-level aggregate data from the Swedish National Agency for Education on 9th grade students’ academic outcomes and the share of 7th graders enrolled in the public schools. I employ a difference-in-difference approach to estimate the reduced form effect of the school mergers. The control group used in the baseline estimation includes all municipalities that had a constant number of public secondary schools during the time period of my study. I move on to use propensity score matching in order to create a more comparable control group. I then estimate a difference-in-difference regression with match-fixed effects. The results show that the mergers have a negative effect on the municipality-level average GPA. In addition, the municipalities where the mergers have been implemented experience a reduction in the share of students that pass all 9th grade subjects as well as an increase in the share of students who do not have sufficient grades to continue to upper secondary school. The school mergers caused the share of 7th graders enrolled in the publicschool sector to decrease by approximately 10 percentage points. These results indicate that the public secondary school merger is not a panacea for improving student outcomes.

The Swedish school system has had a long tradition of equality and later on, equivalence, where the municipalities have a large responsibility as well as freedom in ensuring that children receive an equivalent education. During some time however, results have shown an increased importance of aspects such as family background and residential segregation for the children’s performances and hence a failing equivalence. The research question for this paper is: How do municipalities interpret their national obligation of ensuring equivalence in school? By preforming case studies in three municipalities with three different organizations, written sources and interviews allow for an in-depth analysis of the organizations in relation to equivalence. Looking at the challenges for an equivalent school today in combination with theories about equality in opportunity and equality in outcome, an analytical tool is created which is used to analyze the municipalities in a comparable way. This paper shows how the interpretations of the national obligation of ensuring equivalence in the three municipalities can be understood in regards to two dimensions – to what extent a municipality is compensating for the children’s family background in their organization and if the municipality prioritize an individual or a collective understanding of equivalence in their organization. The paper illustrates how a to vague legislation about equivalence may lead to very different organizations that in turn may threaten the national goal of equivalence.

The aim of this study is to examine different types of didactic methods and strategies that teachers can use and incorporate in the classroom to strengthen and enhance equity and to ensure an equal education for all students despite socioeconomic background. The paper begins with an explanation of relevant concepts such as equity, socioeconomic background and so called freedom of school choice.  The paper then goes on to discuss and describe a number of methods and strategies that are well known in research and proven to work to compensate for students' different backgrounds and conditions in school. The focus is on strategies that can impact students academic performance and that can create opportunities for everyone, and tools that can be used by teachers in everyday practice in a swedish classroom and how to concretely handle differences that are on account of social class.  The method used for this study was a systematic literature review, which is a method that collects and analyzes data and empirical evidence from several studies in a systematic way. The databases used were LibSearch and SwePub.  The results show that the following learning strategies that have a significant impact on students' academic performance are: relationship building, expectations of students, differentiation, working in groups and collegial learning.

Genom en maktanalys undersöks i den här uppsatsen hur ishockeyspelarnas idrottsliga kvalitet kontra deras socioekonomiska förutsättningar framställs i Fredrik Backmans roman Björnstad. Utifrån Michel Foucaults teori om det dynamiska styrkeförhållandet görs en analys av hur maktförhållandena utspelar sig mellan spelare med olika idrottslig kvalitet och socioekonomisk bakgrund. Analysen inleds med en genomgång av den våldtäkt som utspelar sig i berättelsen och fortsätter sedan med en diskussion om vilka olika medel som används i texten för att framställa spelarnas kvalitet och socioekonomiska bakgrunder. Genom att sedan analysera olika avsnitt i berättelsen diskuteras hur de dynamiska maktförhållandena utspelar sig mellan utvalda spelare och andra karaktärer kopplade till ishockeyklubben. I samband med maktförhållandena diskuteras även härskartekniker som utspelar sig mellan karaktärerna. / Through a power analysis, this paper examines how the athletic quality of the ice hockey players versus their socio-economic conditions is made in Fredrik Backman's novel Björnstad. Based on Michel Foucault's theory of dynamic strength, an analysis is made of how power relationships occur between players of different sports quality and socioeconomic background. The analysis begins with a analysis of the rape in the story and then proceeds with a discussion about the different means used in the text to produce the players' quality and socioeconomic backgrounds. By then analyzing different sections of the story, I discuss how the dynamic power relationships occur between selected players and other characters associated with the ice hockey club. In the context of power relations, master suppression techniques are discussed that the characters use.

This study focuses on intergenerational transmission of socioeconomic resources in multiple dimensions and decomposes the influence of parents’ education, social class, and income in relation to the same outcomes for children as well as the unique impact of mothers and fathers on sons and daughters. In order to minimize measurement error in parental characteristics and life course bias for children, high quality Swedish administrative register data (spanning over 40 years) is utilized. A sibling correlation approach is employed to establish the net influence of each parental resource, both in general and by parents’ and children’s gender. The results show that intergenerational inequality is subject to resource specificity. First, same resource transmission implies that the same parental resource as the child outcome matter most in transmission of advantage. In this sense, educational elites foster educational elites, while economic advantage favor children’s own economic status. Second, the intermediate and overlapping socioeconomic field resource, parental social class, explains most of children´s outcomes in education and income suggesting that there is a same field transmission. Parental resources explain little variation in its field opposite (i.e. parental education on child income and parental income on child education). Finally, whether or not intergenerational inequality is subject to gender specificity is ambiguous, it ranges from negligible to substantial contributions. Mothers’ and fathers’ resources do matter independently over all outcomes, where especially fathers’ income dominate and drives the total influence of parental income. However, the result for the same gender transmission is mixed. The conclusion is that gender and, especially, resource specificity cannot be neglected without biasing results, confusing time trends, and underestimating the true rate of intergenerational inequality. Intergenerational processes of inequality will be misrepresented in a unidimensional conceptualization of socioeconomic transmission, which will also affect both theoretical understanding and the prospects of policy intervention.

Family is a unit of socialization and transmitter of social, cultural and economic resources. Thus family arrangements may result in unequal future outcomes for the children growing up in them. A case in point is children from single parent households. The aim of this study is to investigate whether children growing up in single parent households in Sweden experience growing disadvantages during the life course, compared to children from two-parent households, and if socioeconomic factors explain this association. Previous literature shows that children from single parent households are disadvantaged but few have investigated the long term effects of childhood household composition in Sweden and whether disadvantages grow over time.  Using Swedish representative, longitudinal data from Generations and Gender Survey round 2 (GGSII), individuals living in Sweden during childhood between ages 20 to 59 were observed during the years 1990 to 2019. With ordered logistic regression for each year, earnings trajectories could be analyzed, with semi-elasticities used for interpretation.  The results showed that respondents from single parent households fare worse in future earnings compared to respondents from two-parent household. This is explained by differences in educational attainment: children from single parent households have lower educational level which produce lower future earnings. The effect is statistically significant during several years after 2010, however, the results show no evidence of growing disadvantages. Socioeconomic background partially alter the association but not entirely. Whether socioeconomic background functions as a confounder or a mediator to the association has not been determined in this study but is an important task for future research in order to establish the causal nature of socioeconomic background in relation to childhood household composition and children’s future outcomes.