Educational equity is on the top of political issues. During the last decade in Germany educational reforms tried intensely to decouple educational chances from social and ethnic backgrounds. A lot of people would agree that educational success should not depend on social and ethnic characteristics of pupils. However, the question whether inequality in education is unfair is still subject of controversial public discussion. There is a variety of ideas and opinions engendering how schools have to proceed to ensure justice for all. Centering on educational equity and its implications this paper explores what adolescents at the end of upper secondary education have learnt about educational justice in a multi-ethnic and economically structured society. This is a research investigation on pupil’s views on justice decoding their implications for equity in education.

In depth the empirical research systemizes two facets. At first I ask for pupils´ conceptions of justice evaluating the educational system of Germany: what do they think is fair or unfair in school education? Pupils were seen as experts of schooling who appraise critically of inequalities, tracking and (social and ethnic) segregation. As Gorard and Smith (2010) have declared in their international study examining pupils views on educational equity, young learners in tracked and stratified school systems perceive more inequality compared to pupils in inclusive school systems. I conceptualize a comparable interest, exploring the German case which is neglected in international research activities so far. Because of the high rate of inequality and segregation in German secondary school tracking it could be assumed that German adolescents perceive some inequalities in education. Furthermore, the empirical work investigates young learners´ understanding of socioeconomic, cultural and political inequity (see Fraser 2003/ Keddie 2012). Finally, I discuss if their thinking about inequalities, tracking and (social and ethnic) segregation could or couldn´t implicate an educational policy that minimizes social and ethnic stratification in education. It is a core question what they expect from politics. Secondly I ask for their experiences of inequalities in daily school life: what do they learn about diversity and racism at school and how do they get involved in inequality and segregation? The second core question understands the pupils as social agents being part of segregated spaces. We know a lot about the importance of informal learning of tolerance and social cohesion in peer constellations at school (Abs et al. 2009/ Buhl et al. 2011). It can be supposed that pupils´perspectives and their understanding of tolerance go back to the kind of experiences they make in learning and living together or separate. Do they value or devalue a more social and ethnic cohesive community and society? In the end the implications for educational equity and the experiences of diversity and inequality will be compared. This paper illustrates what pupils in a tracked and stratified school system learn about justice and it spotlights the risks and chances for the multi-ethnic German society.

At the ECER in Spain two years ago I presented first ideas of my research. In Porto I will show the final results closing by a discussion of inequality and justice in education brought from the German case to a European level.   

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