Languages data
From the 1970s onwards John Eversley was involved in advising local authorities on how to claim resources under Section 11 of the 1996 Local Government to ‘meet the needs of immigrant populations’. A vital resource was data collected on the languages spoken by school pupils. It was not a measure of whether pupils spoke English fluently as was, and still is, frequently stated or implied, but it was a good indicator of ethnic diversity. Furthermore as the data collection became more systematic, it could be linked to other indicators at pupil level – eligibility for Free School Meals (a crude measure of deprivation) and pupil attainment, for example. In 2000, Philip Baker and John Eversley published Multilingual Capital, an atlas of the languages spoken by London’s state school children. This was updated, using 2008 data as Language Capital. Unfortunately the publisher ceased trading the week of its publication, so it is not available, but a User Guide (Eversley et al, 2010) gives some insight into it.
Eversley, J.; Mehmedbegovic´, D.; Sanderson, A.; Tinsley, T.: von Ahn, M.: and Wiggins, R.D. (2010) Language Capital – Mapping the languages of London’s schoolchildren London: CILT User Guide
Baker P and Eversley, J: Multilingual Capital: the languages of London’s schoolchildren and the economic and social implications. Battlebridge Press. January 2000