Education - Social Class

Question 1

Garrord? Global disparities

Answer 1

Malala Yousafzai. Lack of access to education for girls in certain countries due to cultural/religious factors.
Educational gap between rural and suburban areas.

Question 2

The Educational Monitoring Project? Global disparities

Answer 2

95% of 3-7 year old enrolled in pre/primary school in Belaurus but only 20% in Ethiopia.

Question 3

UN/Gender Parity Index? Global disparities

Answer 3

Gender parity is reached when GPI is between 0.97 and 1.03 - Most Western countries have a GPI of 1.

Question 4

UNESCO? Global disparities

Answer 4

Reasons for poorer countries having restricted opportunities for girls:

• constraints within the family
• constraints within society
• policies of school system and educational practices
• benefits of education

Question 5

Filmer? Global disparities?

Answer 5

Ethnicity, gender and locality are factors influencing educational opportunities but he states that globally, poverty is the most significant factor holding students back.
E.g. in Somalia, average never attended school is 53% but among the poorest children this figure is 86%.

Question 6

Becker? Social class, inside factor

Answer 6

Interactionist explanation
Labelling
Teachers see middle class students as the ideal students in terms of performance, conduct, appearance and attitude (more important than ability). Label them as the ‘ideal pupil’. Labels applied which will shape the nature and quality of interaction between pupil and teacher. Self-fulfilling prophecy.
Labels wc as unnsuccessful which may lead to their lack of achievement.

Question 7

Keddie? Social class, inside factor

Answer 7

Interactionist explanation
Streaming groups based on ability found evidence of teachers expectations being less for those in bottom sets. Streaming had a profound effect on teacher attitude and practice.
A streamers had minimum supervision
C streamers needed social control, linked to anti-school subcultures.

Question 8

Hargreaves? Social class, inside factor

Answer 8

Interactionist explanation
Pupil subcultures
Selection of streams was closely related to behaviour. The top streams were rewarded for behaviour, conformed and achieved. The lower streams felt unable to achieve so sort alternative status from their peers. Anti-school attitudes. Subcultural acceptance more important to bottom streams than occassional praise.
Following processes about labelling:
- speculation
- working hypothesis
- elaboration - confirming or rejecting their guesses about a student
- stabilisation - teacher interprets everything about the student based on their judgements.

Question 9

Abrahams? Social class, inside factor

Answer 9

Interactionist
Interconection between setting, labelling and subcultures.
Domaninat class and gender ideologies are presented, resulting in labels from teachers.
Suggests trainee teachers needs training about how this labelling occurs and its effects.
Thinks that streaming should be stopped.

Question 10

Willis? Social class, inside factor

Answer 10

The ‘lads’. Felt superior to the conforming pupils, as they were more focused on ‘having a laff’ and being deviant.
Showed little interest in academic work and saw manual work as superior to mental work.
They adopted this lifestyle later on the ‘shop floor’ of factories. The counter school subculture helped prepare them for the boredom and monotomy of the work.
Peer group was anti-school.

Question 11

Mac and Ghaill? Social class, inside factor

Answer 11

Pupil subculture
‘The Making of Men’ studied a range of subcultures within school an noted that wc boys generally followed their dads into working class jobs.
The Macho Lads subculture. Their ability to perform manual jobs shaped their working class identities.
Deindustrialisation meant they didn’t see the value of education as they couldn’t get a manual job.

Question 12

Althusser? Social class, inside, Marxism

Answer 12

Education has two roles:
- to pass on necessary skills to create a good workforce
- to pass on ruling class ideologies
Ruling class use ideological control to ensure that students conform to rules.
Education is the ideological state apparatus which refers to how insitutions are used by the ruling class to pass on their ideologies. Maintains the subordinate position of the wc.
Trained to be unquestioning, subordinate, hard-working and conformist.

Question 13

Bowles and Gintis? Social class, inside, Marxism

Answer 13

Education reporduces the capitalist relations of production with the appropriate skills and attitude.
The ‘correspondence’ principle suggests that what we learn in school corresponds directly to the world of work, e.g. working for rewards.

Question 14

Durkheim? Social class, inside, Functionalism

Answer 14

Education should pass on value consensus and social solidarity.
Ensures people have the skills needed for a specialised division of labour e.g. through specific subject skills.
Standardised testing helps to assess skills.

Question 15

Davis and Moore? Social class, inside, functionalism

Answer 15

Education performs role allocation which helps sift, sort and grade students.
Those with the best ability are rewarded in a meritocratic society in terms of economic rewards to ensure that the best people fill the most functionally important roles.

Question 16

Eysenck? Social class, outside factor, New Right

Answer 16

IQ is largely inherited and claims that between 60 and 80% of intelligence is genetically based (Hernstein and Jensen). 
Class differences in intelligence largely account for class differences in educational achievement.

Question 17

Smith and Noble? Social class, outside factor, material factor

Answer 17

Some students face ‘Financial Barriers to Learning’ due to their parents low income.
Due to this, parents are unable to afford:
school uniforms, transport, textbooks, class materials, which can lead to isolation and bullying.

Question 18

Raey et al? Social class, outside factor, material factor

Answer 18

Economic capital is needed to gain cultural capital.
Private education is another way of paying into cultural capital.
WC students are more likely to have part time jobs, so more likely to work longer hours reducing their chances of attaining higher grades.
25% of privately education students have private tuition compared to 10% of state education students.

Question 19

Callender and Jackson? Social class, outside factor, material factor

Answer 19

Discuss the ‘Fear of Debt’ and found that those afraid of debt were four times less likely to apply for University.

Question 20

Douglas? Social class, outside factor, cultural factors

Answer 20

The most significant factor that affected students attainment in his study was the degree of parents interest. He judged the idea that MC parents were more liekly to encourage attainment based on the indicator of more frequent visits to the school to discuss their child’s progress.

Question 21

Feinstein? Social class, outside factor, cultural factor

Answer 21

Parental interest was a significant factor in educational attainment and that class differences existed in terms of support. 
He measured parental interest by asking the teacher's assessment/judgement by how much interest parents showed in their child's education.

Question 22

Bernstein? Social class, outside factor, cultural factor

Answer 22

Importance of language upon educational attainment in relation to social class.
He defines the ‘restricted code’ and the ‘elaborated code’ and argues that the middle class are able to use both of these codes, where the WC only have access to the restricted code.
- Restricted code: relatively informal and lacks in-depth descriptions. Additional information is needed to gain a full meaning.
- Elaborated code: Used in relatively formal, educated situations. Wider description and no prior knowledge is needed to understand due to the in-depth nature.

Elaborated code is rewarded more in exams e.g. good use of language and it also allows students to engage in class discussions and improve their writing language.

Question 23

Sugarman? Social class, outside factor, cultural factor

Answer 23

WC formed a different subculture based on:

• Fatalism
• Immediate gratification
• Present time orientation
• Collectivism - loyal to the peer group instead of focusing on their own success.

Question 24

Bordieu? Social class, outside factor, Marxism

Answer 24

Education is biased in favour of the dominant social classes, devauling the norms and values of the WC.
Linked to cultural deprivation.
Acknowledges the impact of economic capital and cultural capital. MC children have more cultural capital.
Argued that WC cultural attributes are rejected because the education system is defined by and for the middle classes who succeed by default as a result.

Question 25

Gerwitz? Social class, outside factor, Marxism

Answer 25

Competition between schools benefits the middle class, who can get their children into more desirable schools. 
Differences in economic and cultural capital lead to class differences in how far parents can exercise choice of secondary school. Professional MC parents tend to be privilidges skilled choosers who understand how the school admission system work. 
MC parents have more economic capital meaning they can move into areas with better schools.