[bayesian_horse]

You are kidding yourself if you think that system isn't also driven by racism. A few decades ago it was virtually impossible for Turkish children to attend Gymnasium, regardless of the grades.

It is hard to quantify, but the attitudes of teachers, in elementary school and beyond, does shape this process. If they don't believe those children can catch up, they won't...

[pluma]

The point is that the division pre-dates the racist impact it has now. Racism and classism go hand in hand in this case the same way they do in many others.

I don't think the multi-tiered system would be salvageable even if there was no racism involved. Whether you doom children to economic failure based on their ethnicity (or lack of fluency in German, which is often abused as a shorthand for "low intelligence") or because of their social status (manifesting in various ways that ultimately lead to "poor performance") doesn't make this system any fairer.