The Children of Immigrants at School explores the twenty-first-century consequences of immigration through an examination of how the so-called second generation is faring educationally in six countries: France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and the United States. In this insightful volume, which began as a project of the SSRC’s Working Group on Education and Migration, Richard Alba and Jennifer Holdaway bring together a team of researchers from both sides of the Atlantic to compare the educational achievements of children from low-status immigrant groups to those of mainstream populations in these countries, asking what we can learn from one system that can be usefully applied in another.

Working from the results of a five-year, multinational study, the contributors ultimately conclude that educational processes do, in fact, play a part in creating unequal status for the next generation in these societies. The comparative nature of the book highlights features of each system that hinder the educational advance of immigrant-origin children, allowing the contributors to identify a number of policy solutions to help fix the problem. A comprehensive look at a growing global issue, The Children of Immigrants at School represents a major achievement in the fields of education and immigration studies.

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