Disadvantaged children who achieve highly at primary school in most cases then fall behind their less able but better-off peers.
England's education system is wasting young talent "on an industrial scale" because of poor progress made by the brightest disadvantaged children once they leave primary school, Alan Milburn, chair of the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, said after publication of a report detailing the educational differences that emerge by the age of seven.
The report found that children from poor or disadvantaged backgrounds who achieve the highest levels at primary school have in most cases fallen behind their less able but better-off peers by the time they sit GCSE exams five years later.
Of almost 8,000 disadvantaged students who achieved top grades in English and maths standardised tests at age 11, only 900 went on to study at an elite university. But if disadvantaged children performed as well at secondary school as their better off peers, another 2,200 would later study at the likes of Oxford or Manchester universities.
The commission's research follows recent data published by the Department for Education (DfE) showing that just 50 children on free school meals were admitted to Oxford or Cambridge last year, compared with 60 from Eton alone.
"The early promise of top-performing poorer children is being squandered," Milburn said. "It is vital that secondary schools focus harder on helping disadvantaged children convert high results at age 11 to excellent GCSE and A-level results in academic subjects, and that all high attainers are given advice, opportunities and support to progress to elite universities."
The researchers from the Centre for Analysis of Youth Transitions – funded by the DfE – concluded that the period between the end of primary school and taking GCSE exams "appears to be a crucial time to ensure that higher-achieving pupils from poor backgrounds remain on a high achievement trajectory", making secondary school a vital point for policies to boost the chances of young people.
The Sutton Trust has previously shown that England's best comprehensives take only half the national average of disadvantaged pupils, in many cases because of high house prices in their catchment areas, while selective schools such as grammars miss out on many able pupils from deprived backgrounds.
"We need to open up our best comprehensives and grammars, with fairer admissions and outreach policies, and we need to ensure that admission to leading independent day schools is based on ability, not ability to pay," said Conor Ryan, director of research at the trust.
Using data from the national pupil database, the researchers followed 520,000 children born in 1991-92 who took standardised tests in state primary schools, and tracked their school career through GCSE, A-level and university admission.
The data confirmed research that poorer pupils are less likely to be high attainers at any age. Only 9% of children from the most deprived families achieved level three in reading and maths at age seven, compared with 27% from the more well-off. At age 11, only 7% of pupils who claim free school meals throughout secondary school achieved level five in English and maths, compared with 19% of the least deprived.
The bright spot in the report was its finding that children from the most deprived backgrounds had a slightly improved chance of getting into top universities despite their lower grades at A-level.
Only 2.5% of pupils who were on free school meals throughout their school career achieved A or B grades in three or more A-level papers, but 2.8% of the total went on to an elite university, while other groups had fewer admissions than achieved the same A-level results. The researchers suggested the difference could be due in part to some elite universities taking account of social background in admissions.
