Inequality within Schools: Ability Grouping and Tracking

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Inequality within Schools Ability Grouping and
Tracking

• Sociology 20228
• September 5,2004

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How Does the Allocation System in America Work in
Practice?
Both Between School and Within School Differences
LEARNING OPPOR-TUNITIES
?
?
?
?
SOCIAL DESTI-NATIONS
EDUCA-TIONAL SUCCESS
?
?
?
SOCIAL ORIGINS
EFFORT
?
?
?
ACADEMIC ABILITY
?
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The Role of Tracking in Americas Allocation
System
How is tracking related to students academic
experiences?
To what extent is grouping a source of inequality
in outcomes?
LEARNING OPPOR-TUNITIES
?
?
?
?
SOCIAL DESTI-NATIONS
EDUCA-TIONAL SUCCESS
?
?
?
SOCIAL ORIGINS
EFFORT
?
?
?
ACADEMIC ABILITY
?
What are the relative importance of ability and
social origins in shaping track placement?
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Grouping Practices in Schools

• Elementary Schools
• ABILITY GROUPING WITHIN CLASSES (e.g., Reading
  groups)
• ABILITY GROUPING ACROSS CLASSES (e.g.,
  pullouts)
• Middle Schools
• TRACKS Students grouped together in several
  classes across academic subjects with differing
  levels of academic content/rigor

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Grouping Practices in Schools

• High School
• COURSE TAKING PATTERNS
• Different types of classes within a given subject
  (e.g., Honors, Advanced Placement, College Prep,
  Remedial, General)
• Advanced Classes (e.g., Calculus, Physics, Fourth
  Year English, Third Year Language) that are not
  required
• The label of Track is difficult to apply to the
  High School curriculum students course taking
  experiences may vary across subjects (e.g.,
  high in math, but regular or low English).

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Rationale of Ability Grouping and Tracking

• Intended to address a fundamental problem of
  schooling
• Students do not come to school with the same
  level of knowledge and/or ability.
• Key Assumption Teachers are more effective at
  instructing students when the level of knowledge
  and/or ability in a class is homogeneous.

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What is Academic Ability?

• Can the student exhibit mastery over the
  material?
• Ex Can the student learn calculus? Can the
  student derive proofs on their own?
• How much time and effort is necessary for a given
  student to exhibit mastery over the material?
• Ex How long does it take the student to learn
  calculus? How much attention from the teacher is
  needed to learn calculus?

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Research on Academic Ability

• Do most students have the ability to master the
  K-12 curriculum?
• Research says, YES.
• Do most students require the same inputs (time,
  effort, instruction) to learn the same material?
• Research says, NO.
• KEY POINT Most students can learn the material,
  but the inputs required differ markedly depending
  on the student.

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Ability vs. Knowledge

• KEY DIFFERENCE
• ABILITY suggests a capacity for learning
  something.
• LEVEL OF KNOWLEDGE (Achievement) indicates
  whether one has actually learned the material.
• It is possible to lack knowledge in a given
  area but to still possess an ability to learn it.

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How Do Schools Assess Student Ability?

• Intelligence Tests
• Have Grown Less Popular over Time
• Problems
• Persistent Group Differences in Tests are Likely
  NOT Due to Ability Rather they are due to
  constricted Opportunities and Caste Status
• Group Differences in Tests Have and Could Be
  Deemed Discriminatory in Court
• IQ tests measure something but is it ability?
  (E.g., The Flynn Effect)

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How Do Schools Assess Student Ability?

• Prior Test Scores, Prior Grades
• Most Commonly Used Indicators of Ability
• Problems
• Content based assessments that are dependent on
  (1) prior learning opportunities (both inside and
  outside schools), (2) prior student effort, and
  (3) students academic ability.
• Conflates the issues of how much students know
  with their ability to know it.

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How Do Schools Assess Student Ability?

• Teacher Recommendations
• Often used alongside grades and test scores
• Problems
• Teachers can be biased in their assessments
  (e.g., same behavior or performance may be seen
  differently depending on ascriptive
  characteristics).
• Teachers may confuse ability with effort or
  help from home.

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Assessing Ability

• Is it possible or necessary to assess student
  ability when organizing students for instruction?
• It is possible to assess some aspects of ability
  (what inputs are needed) but not all (capacity).
• It is not necessary but it COULD be helpful.

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Sorting by Tracks
All of the Race/Ethnicity Relationship and much
of the SES relationship is INDIRECT

Race/Ethnicity
Test Scores and/or Grades

Track Placement



Socioeconomic Status
A Direct Effect of SES on Track Placement Remains
Even after Controlling for Academic Performance
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Sorting by Tracks

• If test scores and grades are the primary means
  of sorting students into tracks, can we conclude
  that the tracking system is meritocratic?
• Equal opportunities, but unequal outcomes ?
  Consistent with MERITOCRATIC MODEL

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Sorting by Tracks

• KEY PROBLEM
• Where do inequalities in prior achievement come
  from?
• UNEQUAL OPPORTUNITIES, ABILITY, OR EFFORT?
• If UNEQUAL OPPORTUNITIES are to blame, then the
  argument for MERITOCRATIC allocation is weakened.

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Sorting by Tracks

• RACIAL AND SOCIOECONOMIC SEGREGATION AT THE
  CLASSROOM LEVEL IF WE SORT ON THE BASIS OF
  ACHIEVEMENT
• Is this acceptable, or should we take concerns
  about diversity into account when sorting
  students?
• ?Should we judge a sorting regime on the basis of
  the process, the outcomes, or a mix of both?

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Sorting by Tracks

• What role should choice students own
  preferences play in assigning students to
  ability groups, tracks, and/or courses?
• Does increased choice by students have
  implications for inequality of opportunities (and
  perhaps outcomes)?

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How Does Tracking Affect Learning Opportunities?

• CURRICULUM DIFFERENTIATION
• ? Instructional Time Total time, Time on
  task, homework time
• ? Content Coverage What is Covered? How Much
  is Covered?
• ? Instructional Quality What types of skills
  are developed? (Writing, Creativity, Problem
  solving?) More engaging pedagogy, classroom
  climate?
• ? Teacher Quality Level of experience,
  qualifications, teaching in-field, etc.

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Track Mobility

• Can students move from one track to another?
• Yes, there is a good deal of track mobility.
• BUT . . .
• There is more movement downward (from higher to
  lower tracks) than upward.

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Track Mobility

• TOURNAMENT MOBILITY in tracking
• Student compete for positions at each level
• Winners continue in their track position
• Losers are eliminated from the tournament and
  do not have the opportunity to move back up

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How Homogeneous are Tracks with Regard to Prior
Achievement?

• There is a good deal of overlap in prior
  achievement across tracks because
• Non-academic factors play too large a role in
  placing students in tracks.
• (E.g., Favoritism based on social class,
  scheduling constraints, scarce resources, etc.)

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How Homogeneous are Tracks with Regard to Prior
Achievement?
In Practice
In Theory
HI
PRIOR ACHIEVE-MENT
LOW
HIGH
HIGH
LOW
MED
MED
LOW
TRACK
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What Effect Does Tracking Have on Student
Outcomes?

• Achievement gains are roughly equal for students
  in tracked and untracked schools
• BUT
• The distribution of gains differs in important
  ways in tracked and untracked school.

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What Effect Does Tracking Have on Student
Outcomes?
UNTRACKED
HI
HIGH
TRACKED
MED
ACHIEVE-MENT
LOW
LOW
TIME 2
TIME 1
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What Effect Does Tracking Have on Student
Outcomes?

• High achievers learn more in a tracked system
  than an untracked system.
• Middle achievers learn about the same in tracked
  and untracked classes.
• Low achievers learn more in an untracked system
  than in a tracked system.

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Why Does Ability Grouping/Tracking Affect the
Distribution of Achievement ?

• THREE THEORIES ABOUT THE SOURCE OF EFFECTS
• Instructional
• Social
• Institutional

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Why Does Ability Grouping/Tracking Affect the
Distribution of Achievement ?

• INSTRUCTIONAL EFFECTS
• Group placements influences the quantity,
  quality, and pace of instruction and hence
  learning.
• WELL-SUPPORTED BY RESEARCH

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Why Does Ability Grouping/Tracking Affect the
Distribution of Achievement ?

• SOCIAL EFFECTS
• Ability groups constitute social settings in
  which individual children evaluate their
  performance and internalize academic norms ?
  Forms expectations for academic performance.
• EITHER WEAK OR NO EVIDENCE

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Why Does Ability Grouping/Tracking Affect the
Distribution of Achievement ?

• INSTITUTIONAL EFFECTS
• Group placements symbolize certain shared
  understandings of the qualities and capacities of
  group members (independent of actual skills) and
  affect how teacher and parent expectations for
  performance.
• SOME EVIDENCE, BUT IT IS ONLY SUGGESTIVE

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Student Effort and Tracking

• STUDENT EFFORT
• Higher track students exert more effort than
  comparable students in low track classes.
• Effort is a strong predictor of achievement.
• Differences in effort across tracks explain only
  a modest portion of track differences in learning.