Career disadvantage at home

The parents are farmers, the daughter a university professor? No problem, you would think. The Swiss education system is one of the most permeable in the world. Even those who first complete a vocational training programme can still study later via a vocational baccalaureate or passerelle. At least that's the theory.

In reality, however, the proportion of children at grammar schools in Switzerland whose parents also attended grammar school or have a higher education qualification is 70 per cent - and has been for many years. «Social background and education have an ultra-stable relationship, with hardly any changes to be observed,» says Rolf Becker, Professor of Educational Sociology at the Institute of Educational Sciences at the University of Bern.

Anyone looking for the causes always ends up with one factor: the parental home. Most mothers and fathers see their child following the educational path they themselves have chosen - and support it accordingly. For example, in a study conducted by the independent Mercator Foundation Switzerland in 2022, more than two thirds of parents surveyed who had completed secondary school stated that they would like their children to do the same. In contrast, only a quarter of parents with vocational qualifications favoured this path for their child.

«You don't want to recommend something to your child that you don't know yourself,» says Stefan Wolter, Professor of Economics of Education at the University of Bern. Parents tend to forget that their knowledge and experience of the respective educational path is usually around 30 years old due to the age difference to the child - and often no longer corresponds to reality. What's more, an academic education with grammar school and university takes much longer than vocational training. «If I can cushion this financially as a parent, especially if the chosen path fails, then I am more willing to support such an educational path than if money is tighter,» says Wolter.

The better the parental income, the higher the rate of grammar school attendance

In addition, higher earners have more opportunities to afford private tuition or a public school. It is therefore not surprising that the link between education and income class is also very clear in the Mercator study: The better the parents earn, the higher the proportion of those who want to send their children to grammar school or have children who attend it.

The social fall height also plays a major role. «All parents have the same goal: that their children should not be worse off than themselves. This means that the children must not be relegated in terms of education,» says educational sociologist Becker. Parents with academics would therefore have a higher motivation for education right from the start - because there is only one way down. «And for academics, social prestige is more important, while non-academics tend to focus more on the economic value of education,» says Wolter.

A child can hardly make up for what it has missed out on in terms of early childhood development at school.

Melanie Häner, education expert, University of Lucerne

However, it is also crucial that children from academic households are demonstrably better equipped cognitively when they enter the education system - and therefore do better at school, at least in the early years. «Cognitive abilities are partly inherited genetically and are also fostered differently from the outset depending on the parental home,» says Melanie Häner, Head of Education at the Institute for Swiss Economic Policy at the University of Lucerne.

However, the schools must be given credit for the fact that the differences at least do not increase from school entry. But they do remain constant. «A study from Germany shows that a child can hardly make up for what it misses out on in early childhood support at school,» says Häner.

Inform parents better about different educational paths

The Swiss education system is therefore far from equal opportunities - even though Rolf Becker points out that two thirds of the Swiss population believe that there are equal opportunities and that anyone who makes an effort can succeed. And because so much depends on the parents, the opportunities to change this are also limited.

What can be done, however, according to the experts, is to inform as many parents as possible about different educational paths, for example through student counselling services, foundations or associations. «There are studies from Germany that show that there are definitely effects here,» says Becker.

He sees another possibility in making access to different types of school as easy as possible. «A child who lives in Emmental may have to take a long bus journey to the nearest grammar school, whereas a child in Zurich does not. Such factors also have an influence on educational decisions,» says Rolf Becker.

It would also help children if the choice of secondary school was not made after six years of school. «With later selection, pupils would have more time to catch up on the head start that many academic children bring with them from their parents' early childhood education,» says Häner.

The education system needs more teachers with a migration background

What stands in the way of this is the fact that teachers are only human - and by no means neutral when it comes to supporting their pupils. «We almost only have teachers without a migration background. It is often enough that someone behaves differently because of their culture and is therefore automatically given less support by the teacher. As a result, they also perform less well as expected,» explains education expert Wolter.

He advocates more standardised and externally conducted examinations, which have hardly existed in Switzerland to date. «This would help to minimise the teacher effects that influence performance assessment - in favour of more equal opportunities.» In his opinion, everyone would benefit from this - including children from academic families. After all, it has long been known that many of them who end up at grammar school or later at university are massively overtaxed. «Only a third of children who go to grammar school actually go on to work in a profession that requires a degree. The other two thirds don't make it through grammar school, don't go to university, drop out or work in a job that would have worked even without studying, despite having a degree,» says Wolter.