The EMA provides financial support for 16-19 year olds from low-income households undertaking appropriate full-time courses at school or college. Young people from low income families are less likely to stay in formal education after compulsory schooling has ended, may leave school without qualifications, and are thus at risk of unemployment or insecure employment and of social exclusion. The EMA aims to reduce financial barriers to staying on, and thus improve post-16 participation, retention and achievement rates in education among young people from low-income families. In Scotland, EMAs were piloted in East Ayrshire from 1999-2000 (Phase 1), and in Glasgow, Dundee and West Dunbartonshire from 2001-2 (Phase 2).

The second stage evaluation of the EMA pilots focused on their impact on attainment, and evaluated both Phase 1 and Phase 2 pilots. It was based exclusively on data from the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) records of national units and courses over the two years after the S4 Standard Grade examinations. Postcode based measures of socio-economic status (SES) were linked to the SQA data. Before the introduction of the EMA, all four pilot areas had higher proportions of young people living in areas of low SES, and lower average attainment, than the rest of Scotland. The evaluation compared the EMA pilots with "control groups" based on schools with similar intake characteristics, but where the EMA scheme was not in operation. Comparing trends in the pilot areas with "control" areas enabled us to distinguish the impact of the EMA from the effects of other initiatives and trends - especially the effects of the Higher Still reforms