Factors Shaping Educational Progress
System dynamics map of factors
Our team constructed a system dynamic model that uses the Stock and Flow model in mapping the different influences a child in low-income circumstances growing up and how it links to educational attainment.
This work built upon prior research conducted in the Bukit Ho Swee neighbourhood, the site of a previous project. The model includes both cognitive and non-cognitive factors that have been identified via literature review and ethnographic research. Ethnographic approach was context-driven so that the causal links were valid in the Singapore context. The literature and model focuses on links relating to internalising and externalising behaviours insofar as they interact with parenting style. I was the overall project lead.
One finding was that parental involvement was a greater factor for children’s educational progress than understood by local social workers, and the environmental influences on children were greater in number and more nuanced than institutionally known.