Geospatial Analysis and Research on Social and Spatial Inequality of Compulsory Education: A Case Study of Hangzhou, China

Equal compulsory education is an important way to realize social and spatial equality, while the uneven allocation of educational resources in different regions and groups results in inequality of opportunity and solidification of social strata. Traditional research conducted on the basis of fixed search range ignores the special institutional background of Chinese school district system. In this paper, an improved Gaussian two-step floating catchment area model is developed taking into consideration the school district system, while the bivariate local spatial analysis method and geographically weighted regression model are employed to study the social and spatial differentiation of compulsory education accessibility and its capitalization effects in Hangzhou. Results show that (1) the improved Gaussian two-step floating catchment area model is more in line with the national condition of China’s “nearby schooling” policy; (2) the accessibility of compulsory schools in Hangzhou shows an obvious core-periphery typology, and the aggregation effect of primary school accessibility is more significant than that of secondary schools; (3) compared to groups with high socioeconomic status, vulnerable groups are highly disadvantaged in terms of access to educational services; (4) spatial heterogeneity exists in education capitalization, and the areas where education accessibility has the strongest impact on housing prices are in the central city with rich high-quality educational resources; (5) high-quality educational resources, high-priced communities, clusters of high socioeconomic status groups, and communities enjoying high-level education accessibility are highly consistent in all spaces, which is the spatial expression of educational inequality. The research on Hangzhou, a regional central city, provides a theoretical basis and technical support for the humanistic shift in the allocation of educational resources.