Dividing younger pupils by ability can entrench disadvantage, study finds

Unsurprising, really, but still worth noting:
"The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), a Paris-based thinktank, analysed successes and failures in education systems in 39 of the world's most developed nations.It found that countries that divided pupils into ability groups at an early age tended to have higher numbers of school drop-outs and lower levels of achievement."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/feb/09/dividing-pupils-ability-entrench-disadvantage
Perhaps more interesting is the differences in what school leads to :
" In the UK, 69.5% of pupils in the last years of secondary school are on academic courses, while 30.5% are on vocational courses. This is the eighth lowest proportion on vocational courses of all countries. Across the OECD, the split between the two types of courses is almost equal, while in Germany, Austria and Finland a higher proportion of pupils are enrolled on vocational courses than academic ones."