Transition to Long-Term Baccalaureate School in Switzerland: Governance, Tensions, and Justifications

Abstract

In Switzerland, the baccalaureate school is an important pathway to university education, and the aspirations of families and students to enter baccalaureate school have grown. However, vocational education and training (VET) remains the predominant educational pathway and has a strong lobby. We investigate how in this context, the transition from primary education to baccalaureate school is governed and justified at the cantonal level. We study how two Swiss cantons try to meet the official or unofficial maximum baccalaureate quotas desired by educational policymakers through different selection procedures and admission criteria. Drawing on the Economics of Conventions, we conceptualize selection procedures as cantonal transition chains and show that the strategies, procedures, and instruments applied in governance are rooted in diverse principles of action. This causes tensions within cantons. Our analysis shows that agency and regulating effects in the governance of transitions must be understood as distributed among actors, technologies, and objects.

Access to Baccalaureate School in Switzerland: Regional Variance of Institutional Conditions and Its Consequences for Educational Inequalities

“…This federal system provides for the far-reaching autonomy of the 26 Swiss cantons in educational policy. As a consequence, the cantons provide different educational structures and apply different regulations in the governance of educational transitions in terms of educational provision and admission regulations [8,[25][26][27]. Considerable differences, however, also exist at the municipal level.…”

Entry into and Completion of Vocational Baccalaureate School in Switzerland: Do Differences in Regional Admission Regulations Matter?

“…In the cantons of Argovia and St. Gall, similar propositions are currently debated in their legislatures. Thus, in contrast to the general baccalaureate, where official or unofficial maximum quotas are applied in many cantons (see Hafner et al in this special issue [2]), there seems to be more political leeway to increase the number of places in FVB schools. Finally, the more pronounced effect of admission regulations on the FVB2 raises questions about the role of training companies and their support for the FVB1.…”

“…There is as yet no nationwide empirical evidence to substantiate this explanation for the FVB. Admission regulations for the general baccalaureate are understood to be one of the main causes of variations between cantons in quotas [13,14] (also see Hafner et al in this special issue [2]). For instance, Buchmann et al show that the probability of entering a general baccalaureate school is lower in cantons with mandatory entrance exams [4].…”

“…Switzerland's educational system is strongly tracked and federally organized at the level of 26 cantons. This gives the cantons substantial leeway in educational provision and admission regulations [1][2][3]. In all cantons, the upper secondary level is divided into a general and a vocational path.…”

Regional Disparities in National Education: Origins, Governance, and Consequences (Special Issue)

“…The paper, "Transition to Long-Term Baccalaureate School in Switzerland: Governance, Tensions, and Justifications" [9], by Sandra Hafner, Raffaella Simona Esposito, and Regula Julia Leemann, provides a second example of how admission regulations govern access to high-prestige Swiss baccalaureate schools. Instead of looking at the nexus between regulations and quotas, as Hänni et al do, they focus on the cantonal governance procedures of the selection process itself.…”