Are tracking recommendations biased? A review of teachers’ role in the creation of inequalities in tracking decisions

Sorting students on the basis of their academic performance into hierarchically ordered curriculums (i.e., between-school tracking) is common practice in various educational systems. International studies show that this form of tracking is associated with increased educational inequalities. As track placement is often based on teacher recommendations, biased track recommendations may contribute to this inequality. To shed light on the role that teachers play in the reproduction of inequalities in school, we conducted a systematic review of 27 recent articles on teachers' between-school tracking recommendations and students’ socio-economic or ethnic background. We find that teacher recommendations are biased against students from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds, yet evidence with respect to ethnic biases is more mixed. While student, parent, teacher, and contextual factors seem to play a role in tracking recommendations, they cannot account for the biases in tracking recommendations. We discuss promising areas for future studies and argue that research on institutional moderators may have more potential than research on psychological mediators to effectively reduce bias in educational institutions.