Differential School Trajectories and Educational Decisions of Migrants in Germany—Descriptive Results and Theoretical Explanations

Abstract

Abstract BiKS Project 7 investigates the mechanisms of disparities in educational success by migration background, especially among students from Turkey, before and after the transition from primary to secondary school in Germany. Using data from the BiKS-8-18 cohort, educational disparities between children with and without an immigrant background were empirically examined using the theoretical distinction between primary and secondary effects of social origin developed by Boudon. The results of the project show that the importance and mechanisms of primary and secondary effects on educational participation differ between students with and without immigrant background. On the one hand, the primary effect of social origin is much stronger for migrant children due to often insufficient German language skills, a lack of context-specific German cultural capital, and familial cultural capital that has lost at least some of its value due to migration. In contrast, the secondary effects of social origin are much weaker for migrant children: When children’s academic performance is controlled for, migrant children have a higher transition rate to upper secondary school, regardless of their social class of origin. Thus, migrant parents’ realization of more ambitious educational goals for their children (small secondary effect) is primarily hampered by their children’s poorer academic performance (strong primary effect).