Twenty years ago the Swedish school system underwent serious change in that students were given the right to choose their school, though those living near each school had priority. Since then, there has been a new geographical debate concerning where students live and go to school and possible implications of this on student educational achievement and educational equality, as well as on students' daily lives. In studies of changes in the school system, travel distances to school have so far been less studied in the Swedish context. In this paper we will analyze the changes in distance to school for 15-year-olds, from 2000 to 2006, in order to identify who, and in which context, is traveling shorter/longer distances, and thus performing a school choice. We use register data from the database PLACE, Uppsala University. The focus is not on effects on achievement, nor school composition, but instead on the difference in ability/possibility of using school choice as measured by distance. A time-geography approach concerning variation in constraints between students is used. School choice may be a matter of preference for certain schools, but importantly, it might also be a matter of time and space restrictions for families with fewer resources: that is, with less spatial capital and a limited opportunity structure. Results show that travel to school distances have increased since the year 2000. Foreign-born students are traveling shorter distances, except for those with highly educated parents. Shorter distances are also travelled by students from families with social assistance and for visible minorities in areas where such minorities exist.
The aim of this study is to estimate the impact of neighbourhoods on educational outcome for adolescents in Sweden. Using a multilevel statistical approach and the PLACE database that consists of a census of individuals in 1990-2000 in Sweden, the paper explores different domains of neighbourhood characteristics that predict educational outcomes in adolescents. Educational achievement in year 2000 was measured for three cohorts, geocoded to their neighbourhood environments. It was found that neighbourhood characteristics related to socioeconomic resources and demographic stability are predictors of individual educational outcomes. A strong association between neighbourhood socio-cultural capital variables and education were also observed. Despite national policies on availability and access to education in Sweden, there are substantial inequalities in educational outcomes that are not simply a result of differences in individual characteristics.
Sweden is today an immigrant country with more than 14% foreign born. An increasing share of the immigrants comes from non-European countries. This implies that Sweden has been transformed from an ethnically homogenous country into a country with a large visible minority. In this paper we survey the effect of this change on school segregation. Building on Schelling's model for residential segregation, we argue that establishment of a visible minority has triggered a process of school segregation that in some respects can be compared with the developments in the United States. In order to test the validity of a Schelling-type process in Swedish schools we compare segregation levels in regions with different shares of visible minority students.We use data from the PISA 2003 survey in combination with register data on the ethnic composition of student population in different parts of Sweden. We find that school segregation is higher in regions with a large visible-minority population.We also find that, controlling for student background, there are smaller differences in performance across schools in regions with low shares of minority students.
While poor health has been associated with economic outcomes at the national level, its effect on economic outcomes at the individual and local level remains less well known. Using nationally representative longitudinal data from Sweden, we examined the extent to which an individual’s poor health leads to poor economic outcomes for that individual. In order to understand the effects of poor health at a regional level, we also examined the spillover effects of the individual’s poor health on the economic outcomes of the people linked to the individual. We report an association between an individual’s poor health and both that individual’s subsequent adverse economic outcomes and adverse economic outcomes of the individual’s network. Our study highlights the importance of the association between health and economic well-being as well as potential adverse spillover effects of poor health on local economies.