6. Education policy Flashcards
Education policy in Britain before 1988: The tripartite system
Include education reform act 1988
- The education act of 1944 brought in the tripartite system so pupils could be selected and allocated to a school, these were identified through 11+ exams.
- Grammar schools offered an academic curriculum and access to non manual jobs and higher education. They were for pupils with the academic ability to pass the 11+, they were primarily middle class.
- Secondary modern schools offer a non academic, ‘practical’ curriculum and access to manual work for pupils who failed the 11+. These were mainly working class.
- Rather than promoting meritocracy the tripartite system and 11+ reproduced class inequality by channeling the two social classes into two different schools that offered unequal opportunities.
Education policy in Britain before 1988: The comprehensive school system
- It aimed to overcome the class divide of the education system and make education more meritocratic.
Education policy in Britain before 1988: Two theories of the role of comprehensives
- Marxists and functionalists see the role of education very differently. Functionalists see it as fulfilling essential functions such as social integration and meritocratic. In contrast, Marxists see education as serving the interests of capitalism by reproducing and legitimising class inequality.
Functionalists argue comprehensives promote social integration. They also see them as meritocratic because it gives pupils a long period in which to develop and show their abilities.
- Julienne Ford (1969): found little social mixing between working class and middle class pupils, largely because of streaming.
Marxists argue that comprehensives are not meritocratic. Rather, they produce class inequality from one generation to the next through the continuation of practice of streaming and labelling.
Marketisation
Marketisation refers to the process of introducing market forces of consumer choice and competition between suppliers into areas run by the state, such as education. Marketisation has created an education market by reducing state control over education and increasing both competition between schools and parental choice.
- Marketisation has become a central theme of government policy since the 1988 Education Reform Act (ERA), introduced by the conservative government of Margaret Thatcher.
Marketisation: parentocracy and the reproduction of inequality
- ‘Ruled by parents’. The concept is associated with markitisation of education which is based on the ideology of parental choice.
David (1993) argues marketised education leads to a rule by parents. This shifts power away from the producers (teachers and schools) to the consumers (parents) and encourage choice, diversity and an increase in standards.
Marketisation: League tables and cream skimming
Publishing schools exam results in league tables = ensures schools that achieve good results in more demand as parents are attracted to those with good league table rankings.
Bartlett - cream skimming: good schools can be more selective, choose own customers & recruit high achieving mainly mc pupils = gain advantage.
- silt shifting: good schools can avoid taking less able pupils who get poor results & damage schools league table position.
Marketisation: the funding formula
Formula written into law by Congress that determines how funds will be distributed in a federal program. Schools are allocated funds by a formula based on how many pupils they attract. More popular schools get more funds, can afford better qualified teachers and better facilities attracting more middle class applicants.
Schools are funded by how many pupils they recruit.
A good school = more money.
Marketisation: Gewirtz- parental choice
- Found parental choice has benefitted m/c parents whose economic and cultural capital puts them in a better position to choose ‘good’ schools
- Studied 14 London secondary schools and found differences in parents economic and cultural capital lead to class differences in how far they could exercise choice of secondary school. Identified 3 types of parents: privileged-skilled, disconnected-local and semi-skilled choosers.
Marketisation: the myth of parentocracy
- Marketisation also legitimates inequality by making it look as if all parents are equally free to choose a good school.Stephen Ball (1994) argues that it makes appear that all parents have the same freedom to choose which school they send their children to them.
Marketisation: New labour and inequality
The new Labour governments in 1997 to 2010 introduced policies that aimed to reduce educational inequality, including:
Designating deprived areas with additional resources
Education Maintenance Allowances: payments to students from low income backgrounds to encourage them to continue after 16 to gai n better qualifications.
Evaluation: Benn: there is a contradiction of reducing inequalities yet favouring marketisation- this is called the new Labour paradox as Labour also introduced tuition fees for higher education that can deter disadvantaged students from going to university. They have also not abolished fees for private schools.
Conservative Goverment police’s from 2010: Academies
-David Cameron stated that the aim of the coalition’s education policy was to encourage excellence and competition by freeing schools from the control of the state.
New style academies (over 50% all schools now academies), free schools, compensatory policies like FSM and pupil premium, Austerity programme (reduce public spending to decrease the national deficit).
Conservative Goverment police’s from 2010: Free schools
Conservative Goverment police’s from 2010: Fragmented centralisation
Ball - promoting academies & free schools = increased fragmentation & centralisation of control over educational provision.
- fragmentation = comprehensive system is being replaced by patchwork of diverse provision involving private providers that leads to greater inequality in opportunity.
- centralisation of control = central government has power to allow or require schools to become academies or free schools to be set up. These are funded directly by central government. Rapid growth has greatly reduced til of elected local authorities in education.
Privatisation: blurring the public and private boundary
Privatisation and the globalisation of education policy
