Los agrupamientos escolares: expectativas, prácticas y experiencias

Grouping students by ability inside schools is a strategy that is spread in many educational systems, although they are under the principles of comprehensiveness. This is the case of Catalonia where, according to PISA 2015, 26% of students are enrolled in secondary schools that group their students by ability in all subjects (6% on average in Spain). This article aims to explore the grouping practices from the data obtained in an ethnography carried out at a secondary school in Catalonia located in a highly disadvantaged context. The research offers conclusive results regarding the ways in which grouping practices, subject to teachers’ beliefs and expectations, condition young people’s experiences, and contribute to naturalize situations of educational and social disadvantage of the most disadvantaged students.