official statistics to study education

Question 1

practical:

Answer 1

+ government collect statistics from schools which saves researchers time and money
+ statistics allow us to examine trends over time e.g. attendance

• governments only collect statistics for their own purpose not for sociologists

Question 2

representativeness:

Answer 2

+ official statistics on education highly representative e.g. state schools must complete school census 3x a year

Question 3

reliability:

Answer 3

+ POSITIVISTS: reliability means they can be used to test and re-test hypothesis to discover cause and effect relationships