Sonia Ilie

University Lecturer

My research explores education inequality through the life course, looking at the socio-economic factors which shape children and young people's access to, and outcomes from, education. I focus particularly on fair access and equitable participation in higher education and how earlier educational experiences affect this. I investigate these issues primarily in relation to the English education system, and also in low- and lower-middle income contexts. My work builds evidence about what is effective in supporting fairer higher education access, widening participation to higher education, and better learning in schools, using large-scale experimental and quasi-experimental research designs. I am a quantitative researcher and evaluation expert, and routinely use large-scale administrative data and longitudinal surveys from a variety of sources.

I was previously Research Leader in education at RAND Europe, where I co-led the organisation's portofolio of large-scale evaluations in education, exploring the effectiveness of established interventions to improve student learning and narrow socio-economic attainment gaps.