The article investigates how gendered and ethnic differences are constructed in reports and teacher’s instructions relating to the school subject of Danish language and literature issued by the Danish Ministry of Education during the period of 2003-6. It identifies a mismatch between the texts’ explicit investments in ideals of equality and inclusion and the way in which they implicitly construct gender and ethnicity through stereotypes. In combination with the particular use of late modern concepts of bildung this results in a hierarchical power ordering of the pupils according to their gendered and ethnical backgrounds. These hierarchies have at tendency to determine weather the ministerial reports identify possible educational challenges as caused by the formal structures of the school system or rather by the pupil herself.