Potential impact on early childhood research and policy. PEARLE has the potential to impact ECEC policy and research in two main ways. First, it has provided much needed evidence on a theme that is relative neglected but increasingly recognised as very important: the peer composition of ECEC centres. It has done so for Germany only, but has nonetheless offered a useful template for research in other countries. The finding that residential segregation is can only partly explain the current distribution of non-monolingual German children across ECEC centres will also have important repercussions. It will draw attention to how admission policies and financial incentives may encourage high levels of concentration. Second, PEARLE has also contributed with some reflections on the topic of peers composition in ECEC. In particular, by reviewing the existing literature, it has argued that if participation in ECEC is considered essential for learning to live together in heterogeneous societies, ECEC centres need to achieve a balanced mix of children from different backgrounds.
Impact on researcher’s career. The Marie-Curie-Skłodowska fellowship has been an invaluable chance for my career. There have been two main benefits. First, at the start of the fellowship, I had published three papers in international peer-reviewed journals. By the end of it, my list of publications has grown by seven additional papers, all published in high-ranking journals such as Journal of Marriage and Family, British Journal of Sociology of Education, Child Development, with two more in the submission process, one revised and resubmitted at Developmental Psychology and one submitted at Labour Economics. In practice, the fellowship has given me the resources to craft a unique profile, maintaining an interdisciplinary but nonetheless coherent research agenda, focused on inequalities in childhood, and the way diverging developmental trajectories may relate to social policies affecting family and education services, housing and neighbourhoods. Second, the MCSA-IF has given me the financial resources to maintain and increase my network and my visibility. Drawing on the research funds available, I have been able to travel and take part in international conferences and seminars, establishing new connections and maintaining collaborations with colleagues in other countries.
