Deteriorating achievement

Reasons and social consequences of low achievement 

Difficulties derived from the social and economic background of students are very often the reasons behind a low achievement and the thing that a student could not fulfil school’s minimum expectations.  Skills that were not acquired during the primary school can hardly be obtained later on and have a negative effect on the whole life perspective of the individual. The lack of key competencies leads to school failures which turn the person to be unmotivated and eventually to drop out of school. 

The lowest achieving student population appears on vocational school all over Europe as this type of school has the lowest prestige. On this level there is an accumulation of problems: without certain knowledge and skills students are not able to learn as much as they should to fulfil the labour market expectations. Their willingness to learn is getting lower and they end up as frustrated and disappointed persons having behaviour issues as well confronting school regulations. Lowest achievers stay in the system many times without getting the proper help they need. They just stay until a while without the chance of catching up with the others. It is also common to have sort of locations where students with the same difficulties are concentrated. This has a negative effect on everyone’s achievement proved by European studies. Furthermore in these locations minorities are many times overrepresented which strengthens their social exclusion.  On system level it means that social inequalities are not even reproduced but strengthened while all the teachers and professionals have a failed career. 

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