School tracking, social segregation and educational opportunity: evidence from Belgium

Jean Hindriks, Marijn Verschelde (), Glenn Rayp and Koen Schoors

Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium from Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration

Abstract: Educational tracking is a very controversial issue in education. The tracking debate is about the virtues of uniformity and vertical differentiation in the curriculum and teaching. The pro- tracking group claims that curriculum and teaching better aimed at children's varied interest and skills will foster learning efficacy. The anti-tracking group claims that tracking systems are inefficient and unfair because they hinder learning and distribute learning inequitably. In this paper we provide a detailed within-country analysis of a specific educational system with a long history of early educational tracking between schools, namely the Flemish secondary school system in Belgium. This is interesting place to look because it provides a remarkable mix of excellence and inequality. Indeed the Flemish school system is repeatedly one of the best performer in the international harmonized PISA tests in math, science and reading; whereas it produces some of the most unequal distributions of learning between schools and students. Combining evidence from the PISA 2006 data set at the student and school level with recent statistical methods, we show first the dramatic impact of tracking on social segregation; and then, the impact of social segregation on equality of educational opportunity (adequately measured). It is shown that tracking, via social segregation, has a major effect on inequality of opportunity. Children of different economic classes will have different access to knowledge.

Keywords: tracking; ability grouping; educational performance; social segregation; inequality; PISA (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D63 H52 I28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 37 pages
Date: 2010-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cis, nep-edu, nep-eur, nep-lab and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Working Paper: School tracking, social segregation and educational opportunity: evidence from Belgium (2010)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:rug:rugwps:10/690

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