Do you like school? Social class, gender, ethnicity and pupils’ educational enjoyment

This study investigates structural inequalities in educational enjoyment in a contemporary cohort of UK primary school children. Foundational studies in the sociology of education consistently indicate that the enjoyment of education is stratified by social class, gender, and ethnicity. Analysing data from the UK Millennium Cohort Study (MCS), which is a major cohort study that tracks children born at the start of the 21st century, we examine children’s enjoyment of both school and individual academic subject areas. The overarching message is that at age 11 most children enjoy their education. The detailed empirical analyses indicate that educational enjoyment is stratified by gender, and there are small differences between ethnic groups. However, there is no convincing evidence of a social class gradient. These results challenge orthodox sociological views on the relationship between structural inequalities and educational enjoyment, and therefore question the existing theoretical understanding of the wider role of enjoyment in education.