Conference Program

How do parental preferences for compulsory schools vary along ethnic, socioeconomic, demographic, and geographic lines? In particular, is school reputation equally important across groups, or does its salience vary systematically across the population and across different residential contexts? This study examines how key school attributes shape parental preferences in an educational landscape characterised by free school choice. We pay particular attention to the role of school reputation and assess whether its importance differs between groups defined by education, income, ethnic background, and residential context. Furthermore, we examine whether preference structures are homogeneous across areas with different socioeconomic and demographic compositions, or whether similar groups express different priorities depending on local context.

To analyse parental preferences and their variation across background characteristics, we conducted a survey including a choice experiment (Davidson et al. 2022; Thompson 2024) and linked the responses to register-based data on place of residence, income, educational attainment, household composition, and labour market attachment. Parents’ residential locations were identified on a 100 × 100 metre grid, and survey responses were linked to Swedish register data by Statistics Sweden. The survey was distributed to all households in two Swedish municipalities (N = 4,526 households) with a child about to enter compulsory school, nine months before school start and one month prior to the school choice deadline (response rate: 29%, n = 1,293 households). Access to full-population register data enables us to assess response patterns and potential representation bias across social groups. The choice data are analysed using Mixed Logit (MXL) models, allowing for random preference variation and systematic heterogeneity across respondents (Louviere, Flynn, and Carson 2010; McFadden and Train 2000).

The results show strong preferences for proximity, experienced teachers, and municipal rather than private providers. Parents also express systematic preferences regarding the ethnic composition of schools. However, preferences are not evenly distributed across the population. The importance of ethnic composition and school reputation varies significantly with parental education and income. Highly educated and high-income parents place greater emphasis on their child attending the same school as friends, highlighting the role of pre-school peer networks in shaping subsequent school choices. These findings suggest that preference heterogeneity – particularly regarding school reputation and social composition – may contribute to sustaining or reshaping patterns of school segregation in systems with free school choice.