Access, Achievements, and Aspirations: The Impacts of School Tracking on Student Outcomes

Though the use of tracking policies to stratify students is commonplace, evidence concerning the effects of ability-based tracking on student performance is mixed. Using rich data from the Hungarian secondary school centralized assignment mechanism and a quasi-experimental framework, we find that attending the highest track noticeably improves standardized test scores and university aspirations two years post-match. Heterogeneity analysis finds this effect is independent of socioeconomic status, prior achievement, and parents’ educational attainment, and we find only limited evidence of peer spillover effects in terms of academic ability. Given socioeconomic disparities in track placement, tracking may reinforce educational inequality.

Bach, Maximilian, Thilo Klein and Sarah McNamara (2024), Access, Achievements, and Aspirations: The Impacts of School Tracking on Student Outcomes, ZEW Discussion Paper No. 24-076, Mannheim.