Retracking on a grand scale: policy and pedagogy in the reform of eastern German secondary schools after the fall of socialism

Abstract

This article reports on a multi‐year study of changes in eastern German schools after the fall of the Berlin Wall. In the wake of national unification, the traditional three‐track structure of the West German educational syatem was re‐institutionalized in eastern German secondary schools. The article explores how teachers respond to this shift from the untracked socialist common school to the new track system. The study found that influences of state policies on teachers’ tracking pedagogy varied. The new institutions have forcefully shaped many teachers’ assumptions about students’ ability and career paths. Value orientations are characterized by ambivalence; while organizational goals and values are very exclusion‐oriented, the role of schools in society is defined in more inclusive terms. Contrary to exclusion‐oriented sentiments, instructional routines changed little; they flow, to a large extent, from the previous inclusive curriculum that was geared to the average or ‘normal’ student during socialist times. The study underlines the importance of examining multiple layers of beliefs and practices for an adequate understanding of the relationship between policy and practice.