Previous School Results and Social Background: Compensation and Imperfect Information in Educational Transitions

In this article, we analyse whether previous school results have a social background-specific impact on a student’s decision to continue in schooling. We refer to the model proposed by Breen and Goldthorpe (1997) and scrutinize the theoretical underpinnings of the interaction between previous school performance and educational choices. We provide two sets of predictions. First, a compensatory effect might occur if inequality is greater among the worst-performing students than among others. In this case, students from socio-economically advantaged backgrounds with poor school results would still move to higher educational levels, whereas students from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds with poor school results would drop out. Second, inequality might be higher among average performers. Both good and poor school results send stronger messages and clearer information than scores in the middle of the distribution. If individuals from different socio-economic backgrounds handle imperfect information differently, then the impact of social background could be larger on average grades than on good or poor ones. To test these hypotheses, we used the French Panel d’Élèves du Second Degré and focused on social background differences in the decision to opt for the academic or the vocational track after the completion of compulsory education. Our findings support the hypothesis of a compensatory effect. In the conclusion, we discuss further general implications of our results for research on educational inequality.