The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) has revealed that the school system in Germany reproduces and even increases educational inequalities. Until today there have been many different interpretations of this result (chapter one). Beside interpretations that are rather monocausal there exist two more differentiated explanations. Firstly, re-analyses of the large-scale assessments explain the phenomenon by effects relating to the type of school as well as to the composition of pupils. Secondly, in the paradigm of structure theory, qualitative studies explore the matching of the institution and the social environment of the pupils. In the discussion following these approaches, multi-professional teams are seen as a possible answer to the problem of educational inequalities. The reason is that they might help to deal with the main contradiction of school: On the one hand, schools have to support the individual development of each pupil. On the other hand, schools must select (chapter two). Based on case studies, the article deals with the question whether the cooperation of multi-professional teams can indeed reduce educational inequalities (chapter three to five). Or may the balancing of dissonances in the professionals’ interpretations induce a school typical or school cultural matching, which leads to the fact that those pupils are disadvantaged who are already not sufficiently supported at school?

Keywords
educational equality, profession, all-day school, school social work, multi-professional teams