This week’s Economist carries an article highlighting positive developments within Britain’s Bangladeshi community. Until now, Bangladeshis have lagged behind other ethnic minorities on most socio-economic indicators, but this is beginning to change. Especially encouraging is the fact that Bangladeshi youngsters are starting to pull ahead in terms of academic achievement.

Historically bottom of the heap of Britain’s south Asian immigrants, [Bangladeshis] have in recent years been bounding ahead. Bangladeshi children… have overtaken Pakistanis at school; they have even narrowed the gap with Indians, the most successful south Asian group. After controlling for poverty, the results are brighter still. Among children receiving free school meals (a useful indicator of poverty), 26% of white children manage five good GCSEs. For Pakistanis this rises to 40%; poorer Bangladeshis rack up 50%.

The report indicates that what is often considered to be a weakness of the community (living in the council ghettoes of Tower Hamlets) can also be a source of strength in this respect.

Overcrowding is rife in the borough, and inner-London state schools tend not to be brilliant. But the highly concentrated nature of the community can be a strength, argues Rushanara Ali of the Young Foundation, a think-tank. “There is masses of social capital,” she says. “People pool their resources to support kids in after-school classes. There’s a lot of informal home-based learning.” The fact that most Bangladeshi migrants come from just one region, Sylhet, binds the community tighter still. And the sheer numbers mean that schools in Tower Hamlets are used to negotiating the language barrier and working with parents and religious groups. Perhaps coincidentally, the borough was also the testing ground for “synthetic phonics”, a way of teaching children to read that seems to work especially well for pupils whose first language is not English.

There’s further improvements in the workplace, with higher participation of Bangladeshi women in the labour force a net gain. Next stop - Britain’s first Bangladeshi MP?

Read the whole thing.