Staff profile

Miss Xin Shao is a doctoral researcher at the School of Education, Durham University and an accredited researcher for the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Department for Education. She is also a reviewer for Review of Education: An International Journal of Major Studies in Education (BERA).

Miss Xin Shao studied Business English for her BA at Nanjing Normal University, gained an MA in English Language & Literature from Nanjing Normal University, an MA in TESOL from Durham University, and a Master of Education by Research from Durham University. She was a teaching assistant on the “British and American Literature” module at undergraduate level in Nanjing Normal University, and a Business English trainer in international companies in China. She has been the president of Model United Nations Conferences and was the trainer for the MUN Nanjing Normal University team for 2 years.

Her current research work concerns equity and equality in education. During her PhD studies, she offers assistance in various research projects, including Philosophy for Children (P4C) (https://www.dur.ac.uk/education/staff/profile/?mode=pdetail&id=11539&sid=11539&pdetail=98432) and the Evaluation of Children’s University Social action trial (https://www.dur.ac.uk/research/directory/view/?mode=project&id=731).

Doctoral project

The impact of socio-economic background and secondary schooling on students’ access to the labour market: Evidence from England

This doctoral project probes into two aspects of young people’s occupational mobility: intergenerational social mobility and social mobility within one’s lifetime. Young people’s early access to the labour market in the UK and other developed countries is still clearly stratified by each person’s prior educational attainment and their socio-economic background. However, these factors are difficult to change, are not the only factors creating stratified outcomes, and may in any case be mediated by other factors such as peer influence. This new project is based on linking two sets of longitudinal data – the Longitudinal Study of Young People in England (LSYPE) and the School Level Annual School Census (SLASC) – in an innovative way to investigate these issues. SLASC provides official figures on the distribution of resources and the stratification of students between schools, and LSYPE provides detailed data on young people’s family background and early occupational status. This research will contribute to furthering policy development maximising equality of opportunity in the labour market and increasing occupational mobility.

Presentation

Xin. S. (2016), The impact of socio-economic background and secondary schooling on students’ access to the labour market. BSA Postgraduate Regional Event 2016 – Educational (in)equalities: Towards an elite but not elitist society. Warwick, UK.

Publication

• Social Mobility
• Human Capital
• Labour Market
• Equity and Equality in Education

Authored book

• Dong, X., & Shao, X. (2012). Practical English Writing. University of International Business and Economics Press

Chapter in book

• Axbey, H. (2019). Neurotypical interventions : a neurodiverse approach to school-based social communication support. In X. Shao (Ed.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (22-30). Durham University, School of Education
• Thompson, S. (2019). Bar modelling and autism – sufficient or necessary in problem solving?. In X. Shao (Ed.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (213-225). Durham University, School of Education
• Key, A. (2019). Exploring the experiences of estranged students in higher education : a longitudinal comparative case study of two UK universities. In X. Shao (Ed.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (95-105). Durham University, School of Education

Conference Paper

• Anderson, S. (2019). Promoting academic buoyancy as a pro-active approach for improving student mental health and wellbeing. In X. Shao, & E. Dobson (Eds.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (11-21)
• Diehl, M. (2019). Engaging the Poet: Exploring poetry through creativity and criticality in English secondary education. In X. Shao, & E. Dobson (Eds.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (44-52)
• Allen, K. (2019). Subcomponents of visuospatial working memory: Investigating the importance of order in sequential recall and its relationship with mathematics performance. In X. Shao, & E. Dobson (Eds.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (1-10)
• Bruni, T. (2019). Acts of Willpower. Developing Cosmopolitan Citizenship Through Student Engagement in Course Design. In X. Shao, & E. Dobson (Eds.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (31-43)
• Shao, X. (2019). Family, School and Job – The Impact of Socio-economic Background and School Segregation on Labour Market Outcomes: Evidence from the Longitudinal Study Next Steps in England. In X. Shao, & E. Dobson (Eds.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (200-212)
• (2019). Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018. In X. Shao, & E. Dobson (Eds.),
• Dobson, E. (2019). A theory-driven thesis: Utilising theory-driven evaluation to guide the conduct and content of a PhD thesis examining peer-led Sex and Relationships Education. In X. Shao, & E. Dobson (Eds.), Imagining Better Education: Conference Proceedings 2018 (53-69)
• Shao, X. (2017). Global Citizenship, Intercultural Experiential Learning and Critical Reflection. In K. Sahan, M. Melsen, A. Tawell, K. Newell, K. Wortmann, & N. Mukhi (Eds.),

Journal Article

• Shao, X. (2018). What is quantitative longitudinal data analysis?. Educational Research and Evaluation, 88-90. https://doi.org/10.1080/13803611.2018.1515749