Educational Research - the Ethics and Aesthetics of Statistics

30 M. Depaepe
Tan’s final verdict: ‘this indicates that the policy that was conducted in the period
under consideration with a view to the dismantling of socio-cultural barriers has,
in large measure, failed’ (Tan, 1998, p. 201). What happened? The concept of the
comprehensive middle school, the nec plus ultra of all the progressive-pedagogical
forces, was rolled back, first by the Liberals and then by the Catholics, who, at the
very best accepted a compromise-like ‘marche en arrière’ with what was called the
‘uniform type’ in general secondary education (Henkens, 2004).
Koen Pelleriaux supported Tan’s conclusion completely. Even though the number
of university students had grown by a factor of 5 in 30 years (and, more specifically,
between 1951–1952 and 1983–1984, and the female population by a factor of
11), the correlation between the professional prestige of the father and the educational
level of the respondent had, he maintained, remained constant. He writes,
‘such a finding places towering question marks about the “democratization” of
education in general and of the university in particular.... The laws “concerning
various measures for university expansion” passed in 1965 nevertheless explicitly
had the intention of giving everyone the opportunity to obtain a university education.
Therefore, the candidature years, at the very least, had to be established “close
to home”. In the light of the data presented here, we must conclude that this ‘democratization’
of higher education has failed. Many more young people received the
opportunity to obtain a university diploma, but the bias toward socially better placed
groups has remained just as large’ (Pelleriaux, 1999, p. 15). For Pelleriaux, this was
one more indication that the Flemish society had become very meritocratic after the
model of a degenerate meritocracy. Children from well-off families could continue
to rely on the advantage of the family fortune so children from economically modest
families were not given equal opportunities and this made them very vulnerable. To
a significant degree, education reproduced social status.
That Pelleriaux, who later went to work for the study service of the Socialist
Party, came to such conclusions – or, inversely, saw precisely in these conclusions
an impulse for political involvement – is certainly not a matter of chance. Indeed, the
Socialists have made the equal-opportunity policy the spearhead of their education
policy in the course of recent years mainly through the efforts of the Flemish minister
of education Frank Vandenbroucke. When his chief of staff, Dirk Van Damme,
received the opportunity in 2008 to lead the CERI of the OECD in Paris, Pelleriaux
succeeded him. He has since become the chief of staff to the present Socialist
minister of education Pascal Smet, who recently succeeded Vandenbroucke.
The Higher Institute of Labour Studies – a research institution within the Catholic
University of Leuven that has historical roots in the Christian labour movement –
has conducted analogous studies. On the basis of these studies, a virtually identical
conclusion was reached: ‘The great expansion of higher education since the 1960s,
therefore, has not led to greater democratization in terms of equal opportunities.
The conclusion is clear: more workers’ children now go to universities and institutes
of higher education than previously. But great expansion of higher education
is still not democratization. Other professional groups are progressing just as much.
In other words, the position of the workers’ children with respect to the others has
not improved since the 1960s. The inequality has remained’ (Groenez, 2008, p. 10).
And here, too, secondary education is painted as the villain: ‘The real solution for