KS4 PI and Parental Occupation Research Summary
From September 2023, parental occupation will be included within the Rare Contextual Recruitment System’s (CRS) algorithm. It will generate a socioeconomic flag when combined with disadvantaged postcode and/or significant term time work commitments. We have made this decision based on a trial of the parental occupation question with data from over 17,000 applicants generated from 18 employers using Rare’s products.
Parental occupation is measured by a question recommended by the Social Mobility Commission (SMC) that captures the occupation of the main household earner when an applicant was aged about 14. These occupations are categorised into three categories by the SMC – professional, intermediate and lower socioeconomic. The SMC recommends parental occupation as the best measure for monitoring socioeconomic background within a workforce.
The CRS’s focus is on identifying candidates for early entry roles who have experienced disadvantage, which is different to the SMC’s focus on workforce monitoring. Rare did not initially include parental occupation within the CRS for a few reasons. Firstly, we identified other measures, such as free school meals, as being a more accurate measure of disadvantage when recruiting for early entry roles, and therefore developed a basket of measures to use within the system. Secondly, parental occupation is not easily verifiable, as it relates to someone other than the applicant. Thirdly, the original recommendation question was too complex as it involved four parts which risked negatively affecting response rates. The SMC changed its recommendation to a single question in 2020 for this reason. Finally, the question can be confusing for applicants who do not know how to categorise their parents’ occupations therefore there is a risk that not all answers will be accurate.
The simplified parental occupation question combined with Rare’s growing dataset from its clients meant that we were able to generate a dataset large enough to confidently trial parental occupation over the past 18 months. Our research revealed the following things:
- The CRS flags already had significant overlap with the parental occupation measure.
- Parental occupation on its own does not capture all forms of disadvantage considered within the CRS, in some cases missing candidates eligible for free school meals, candidates who have spent time in local authority care and candidates who have attended low performing schools.
- In some cases, students with parental occupations considered to be lower socioeconomic are not in fact disadvantaged, and in a minority of cases, could be considered to be advantaged.
Our modelling suggests that by allowing parental occupation to generate a socioeconomic flag when combined with disadvantaged postcode and/or significant term time work commitments, the CRS will now flag a significant majority of students selecting lower socioeconomic parental occupations, whilst avoiding flagging students who are not in fact disadvantaged.
KS4 Performance Index
When we launched the CRS one of its most innovative features was the Performance Index (PI). We know from research that candidates who significantly outperform at school are more likely to become outperformers in the workplace. Anecdotal evidence, as well as intuitive logic, suggests that candidates who get good grades in a school where few others do are not just bright but also resilient and determined.
To date, PI has simply been a reflection of performance at Key Stage Five – that is, A Level or equivalent. Now, for the first time, we’re launching Key Stage 4 PI (KS4 PI).
KS4 PI has two uses:
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Most obviously, it provides a PI metric for those candidates applying to apprenticeship or school leavers programmes who do not (or do not yet) have A Level results. This makes recruitment for apprenticeship and sixth form work experience programmes considerably more precise – especially if the goal is to identify high-potential candidates for these programmes.
- It helps identify in the graduate recruitment process the 9% of candidates who attend a low-performing KS4 school and do well, then switch to a high-performing KS5 school, and again do well, but because they are in a high-achieving cohort still get a low KS5 PI. Up until now the data point on their resilience and determination has not been easy to spot: KS4 PI highlights it.
So, who are the people who come into this category? We interviewed two of them, both of whom went to low-performing KS4 schools, got stellar grades, then moved to high-performing KS5 schools and got stellar grades again. Watch highlights of Katiann and Tumi talking about their experiences.