What Happens to the Learning Outcomes of Left‐Behind Children When Parents are Away? Evidence From Four Pacific Island Countries

School disruption of children in China: The influence of parents’ rural–urban migration

Some Common Fallacies About Migrants’ Remittances in the South Pacific: Lessons from Tongan and Western Samoan Research

In this study, I use the origin–destination approach to investigate the socioeconomic status and subjective well-being of children of Chinese migrants in Hong Kong in comparison with children of individuals who remained in Guangdong (“Guangdong stayers”) and Hong Kong natives. Furthermore, I explore the heterogeneity among migrant groups based on parents’ pre- and post-migration occupational status to examine the association between migrant parents’ intragenerational mobility and their children's intergenerational mobility. Two comparable representative surveys were used: the 2010 China Family Panel Studies and the 2011 Hong Kong Panel Study of Social Dynamics. The results showed that the children of Chinese migrants achieved higher levels of objective and subjective well-being than the Guangdong stayers. Within the migrant groups, the children of all migrants, particularly those of low-skilled migrants, experienced upward mobility. The occupational achievements of the children of highly skilled migrants reflected their parents’ pre-migration occupational status. Children of all migrants achieved comparable levels of occupational success in the Hong Kong labor market.

ABSTRACTScholarship has examined how immigrant parents in North America and Europe acculturate their children to the education system in their receiving societies, with a focus on overcoming language barriers and coping with cultural differences in education between home and host societies. However, relatively less attention has been paid to the efforts of migrant parents in circumventing structural obstacles to the education access of their migrant children. To address that gap, this study draws on the qualitative data obtained from 23 rural-urban migrants in South China to investigate how these parents help their migrant children access urban education resources in a social context where structural obstacles outweigh cultural/racial differences. This study defines migrant parents as active agents who use strategies and actions to adapt to, manoeuvre within or circumvent the structural constraints to augment urban education resources for their migrant children. The migrant parents’ agency includes persistent efforts in obtaining urban hukou for their children; applying strategies to increase their children’s qualification for public schools that use a point system; exploring guanxi and using tiger parenting to get their children into public schools; exchanging economic resources for education opportunities in elite private schools; purchasing extracurricular education services; and actively maintaining parent-teacher partnerships to support their children’s schooling. While valuing the migrants’ agency, this study also indicates that the efficacy of their actions and strategies is affected by disparities in their socioeconomic resources.

BackgroundChildren who suffer from parental migration have been manifested to exhibit physical and mental impairments at higher rates. This current study aims to explore unintentional injury disparity among schooling left-behind children, migrant children and residential children in China, and to examine the risk factors of unintentional injury among the three types of children based on a multi-level system framework. This study will fill the gaps of this topic for China and contribute to the world literature in the context of countries with frequent population migration.MethodsData for 4479 children aged 6–16 of a representative population sample were obtained from a survey conducted in China in 2017. Child’s unintentional injury in this survey was measured based on the definition and classification of ICD-10. Descriptive analysis, multivariable logistic regression and zero-inflated negative binomial regression were employed in this study.ResultsLeft-behind children showed higher prevalence of total unintentional injury than migrant and residential children, as well as in 14 specific unintentional injuries. There was a statistical difference between left-behind and residential children’s unintentional injuries, but no significant difference was found between migrant and residential children. Results also indicated that both individual and environmental factors constructed as a multi-level system were associated with children’s unintentional injuries.ConclusionsFamily migration may have contributed to the increased unintentional injury risks among children. Left-behind children were more vulnerable to suffer from unintentional injuries than migrant and residential children, and specific attentions should be paid to unique group of children, especially the left-behind children. Given the importance and serious consequences of children’s unintentional injuries, the findings may provide implications for necessary intervention.

The integration of migrant children into German society is a controversial pedagogical task for educational institutions. An important part of this task is assigned to the kindergarten, since the early learning of social values and norms increases the chance of integration. The increasing number of migrant children in kindergartens has confronted teachers with new problems and changed tasks. In the 1980s, almost all kindergartens have migrant children enrolled in them; in some urban areas, there are kindergartens with 50% or more migrant children students. Some migrant children confront the use, or the continous use, of the German language for the 1st time in kindergarten. A secondary danger is abandoning a child with incomplete knowledge and inadequate German. These children will encounter new language problems in school. Although very little information is available on migrant parents' opinions of kindergartens, the limited data available indicate that parents generally respond favorably, although they fear alienation from their children. The migrant parents expect the kindergartens to teach their children German. The German kindergarten will not and cannot prepare children for life in their home country, even if it is kindly disposed towards a multitude of cultures. The kindergarten is only able to prepare children for life in Germany. Migrant children have special problems with bilingualism and cultural distance. Migrant children do not "cause" problems. Rather they offer an occasion to reflect on the work of the kindergarten and to include new and different experiences.

In Bangladesh, as in other low- and middle-income countries, parents frequently migrate to other areas, often for employment opportunities, leaving their children behind with the hope that their earnings will contribute to securing a better future for them. However, the absence of parents due to migration can have negative implications for the well-being of these left-behind children. Despite the existence of studies investigating this phenomenon, the evidence thus far has produced inconclusive findings, with no specific data available from Bangladesh. Therefore, the objective of this study was to examine the effects of parental migration on the early childhood development of left-behind children in Bangladesh. The present study utilized data from the Bangladesh Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) conducted in 2019. A sample of 8,833 children aged 3-4 years was included in the analysis. The Early Childhood Development Index (ECDI) and its individual domains served as the outcome variables of interest. The primary explanatory variables considered in the analysis were father migration, mother migration, migration of both parents, and migration of either parent. To assess the association between the outcomes and explanatory variables, multilevel logistic regression analysis was employed, controlling for relevant covariates. Approximately 29% of all children in the study were not developmentally on track, as measured by the ECDI. When examining the individual domains of the ECDI, only 9% of the total children demonstrated developmental progress in the learning domain. Regarding the association between parental migration and ECDI outcomes, we observed a 26% decrease in the likelihood of overall ECDI among children with a migrated father (OR: 0.74, 95% CI: 0.54-0.93). This decrease became even more pronounced, reaching 37% (OR: 0.63, 95% CI: 0.48-0.97), among children with both parents migrated, compared to children with neither parent migrated. The findings of this study indicate that parental migration, especially when both parents are involved, has a substantial negative impact on the likelihood of achieving favourable ECDI outcomes for children in Bangladesh. To ensure the optimal development of children with migrating parents, it is crucial to strengthen early childhood development education programs and implement robust social safety nets. These efforts should specifically target the unique needs and challenges faced by children with migrated parents, providing them with the necessary support and resources for their holistic development.

An increasing number of migrant children are involved in public education due largely to the policy for migrant children education outlined by the Government of China from the late 1990s. In this article, we describe the unique and often difficult situation rural migrant children face after they enter urban public schools. Drawing from the Theory of Inclusive Education and data collected at two public junior high schools in Beijing, we provide an in-depth analysis on migrant children’s education from their own viewpoint and from the perspectives of their parents, teachers, and school administrators. Our survey results identify the need for further adjustments of the existing education system which can help improve migrant children’s education in China. Findings also highlight the dilemmas regarding how to best meet the needs for teachers, migrant parents, and migrant children who attend public schools. In order to provide a quality education for migrant children, we conclude by arguing that there must be a three-pronged partnership to best accommodate the unique education needs of migrant children in urban China.

<scp>COVID</scp>‐19 and <scp><i>Re</i>‐Storying</scp> Economic Development in Oceania

ABSTRACTThis paper examines composition of households formed after the outmigration of a household member in rural Cambodian and correlates household types with indicators of economic condition. The paper focuses on households containing left-behind parents and the children of migrants. Excess mortality in the 1970s due to war suggests the association between migration and economic condition may be gendered. This could be exacerbated when migration leads to a skip-generation household containing a left-behind parent and a child of migrant without an own parent of the child present. Data come from the Cambodian Rural-Urban Migration Project (CRUMP), a project designed to study migration in rural Cambodia. Most households formed after a migration contain a left-behind parent of migrant. While about 22 per cent of these households contain a left-behind child of migrant, the per cent is over 60 per cent when the migrant is themselves a parent. The economic situation tends to be worst for left behind solo mothers (mothers of migrants who do not live with a spouse) and best for left-behind coupled parents of migrants. There is evidence that the combination of left-behind solo mothers living with children of migrants in a skip-generation situation is the most disadvantaged.

Do the returns to migration extend beyond migrants themselves and accrue to the children of migrants? Drawing upon data from a unique 19-year longitudinal survey from Tanzania, this paper empirically investigates this question by exploiting the variation in the outcomes of the children of migrants and the children of the migrants’ siblings who stayed behind conditional upon a range of individual characteristics of their parents. I show that parental migration has important implications for child development. This relation depends on the destination and the timing of the move. More specifically, children whose parents migrated from rural areas to cities are heavier, taller and more educated for their age. The effects on height and schooling are strongest for children who were exposed to the city environment during their early childhood. In contrast, children whose parents moved to a different rural village do not appear to experience any health advantage and those moving alongside their parents even start schooling at a later age. In addition to conferring a broader view of the returns to physical mobility, this analysis contributes to the debate on the origin of spatial inequalities in developing countries.

Background: According to data provided by the Ministry of Education and Science, 187.9 thousand children and youth from Ukraine have enrolled in Polish schools and kindergartens who came to Poland since the war broke out (Krawczak, 2023). Based on data from the SIO database as of February 14, 2023, 1,792 Ukrainian teachers are working in Polish schools and educational institutions (Krawczak, 2023). Among them, 1,120 teachers have been employed in schools and educational institutions since February 24, 2022. The Polish state had to quickly integrate Ukrainian children in the education system. The Ministry of Education and Science has undertaken several initiatives aimed at facilitating the integration of children and youth from Ukraine to Polish schools (Minister Edukacji iNauki, 2022). The teaching staff at schools were unprepared to work with pupils with minority ethnic backgrounds. Communication between teachers, migrant children and their parents has become one of the most significant challenges. Purpose: The main aim of the paper is to propose the application of microanalysis of communication for analyzing conversations between migrant parents and teachers in Poland. To the best of our knowledge, no previous research has investigated the communication process between teachers and migrant parents using microanalysis of communication in Poland. Results: Access to education is one of the dimensions of structural integration of migrants. In most countries migrant children are entitled to education, however, access remains difficult. Migrants may face cultural, economic or practical barriers to effectively exercising their right to education. Lack of knowledge or insufficient knowledge of the language of the country of immigration is one of the most common barriers in access to education. This applies not only to migrant pupils themselves, but also to their parents, who play an important role in successful education of migrant children. Therefore, it is necessary to examine communication between migrant parents and teachers, identify challenges, and develop address with these challenges. The article proposes a method of micro-analysis of communication in order to study communication challenges in conversations between migrant parents and schoolteachers in Poland. This method of communication has not been used in such a context before, hence the proposed research is pioneering. Keywords: Microanalysis of communication, migrant parent, students with migratory experience, language education, intercultural communication.

This study aimed to examine the psychological and behavioral effects of family migration on left-behind (left by one or two parents) and migrant children. Participants included children from the National Children’s Study of China (N = 18,396, aged 7–15 years, 50.6% boys) including both left-behind and migrant children (n = 1168, 839 and 1185, respectively). Children from non-migrant families were also examined (n = 5126) as a reference group. The results indicated that left-behind children with two migrant parents have greater depression and engage in more unhealthy behaviors than do non-migrant children from rural families, and left-behind children with one migrant parent showed comparable developmental outcomes to non-migrant children. Family factors were found to be positively associated with migrant children’s development. Teacher support was found to be more important for middle school students than for elementary school students in terms of school liking. Belief in a just world was more beneficial for mediating girls’ depression than boys’. Furthermore, for girls, the negative predictive effect of perceived parental support for unhealthy behaviors is smaller for left-behind children with two migrant parents and migrant children than that for non-migrant children. For boys, the negative predictive effect of perceived parental support on unhealthy behaviors is greater for migrant children than that for non-migrant children. This research depicts a comprehensive model of how family migration affects children’s development, and its findings could be of value in regard to creating family- and school-guiding policies for migrant workers.

ABSTRACTAnalyzing data of a merged sample of two Chinese student surveys conducted in two rural counties of Hunan province and in the capital city of Guangdong province, this paper examines the impact of parental migration on rural children’s involvement in delinquent behaviors. We compare delinquency of non-migrant and left-behind children in the countryside, rural-to-urban migrant children, and urban local children. Both rural children left behind by one migrant parent and those left behind by both migrant parents are similar to rural children without parental migration in terms of delinquent involvement. The situation of rural-to-urban migrant children is noticeably worse, as they are more likely to engage in delinquent behaviors than rural children without parental migration. Nevertheless, rural-to-urban migrant children are not more prone to delinquency compared to their urban local peers. We also found an acculturation impact in the study because the odds of engaging in delinquent behaviors first increases and then decreases for rural-to-urban migrant children when they stay longer and learn some local language in the hosting city.

Supporting each other: Pacific emergency care clinicians navigate COVID-19 pandemic challenges through collaboration