Education Topic 6 - role of education Flashcards
(28 cards)
Organic analogy
Functionalist - the body is society and the organs are the institutions in society such as education and family. In order for the body (society) to function, all the organs (institutions) must work together
Social solidarity (one theorist)
Durkheim - argues society needs a sense of solidarity, for members to feel part of a single body or ‘community’. Transmitting society’s culture (shared beliefs and values) from one generation to the next, instilling a shared commitment to a wider social group.
- ‘society on miniature’: school prepares us for life in wider society e.g. cooperate with people according to impersonal rules that apply to everyone
Teaching specialist skills (one theorist)
Durkheim - involves the National Curriculum, modern industrial societies involves a very complex division of labour within the workplace, which requires very specialist skills. Durkheim argues school teaches these skills needed to play the part in industrial societies
School as a ‘focal socialising agency’ (one theorist)
Parsons builds on the work of Durkheim, suggests that school is a FSA that bridges the gaps between home and wider society. School teaches skills and behaviours that are different from what is taught in the home
Particularistic standards
Happens in the home/family, involves rules that only apply to the child (favouritism). A child’s status is also fixed at birth e.g an older boy may have more rights in the family than his younger sister
Universalistic standards
Happens at school/in wider society, impersonal rules e.g. same laws applying to everyone and judgement against the same standards. Status is largely achieved, lack of favouritism as everyone is treated the same
Meritocracy (one theorist)
School prepares us to move from the family to wider society because both school and wider society are based on meritocratic principles. Meritocracy - we all have the same access to opportunity and you are rewarded through efforts and ability
Role allocation (two theorists)
Davis and Moore (functionalists) believe that in a complex society we need schools to help ‘sift and sort’ pupils into roles based on their aptitude and ability.
- Believe inequality is inevitable because not everyone is equally talented
- By keeping wages high in highly skilled jobs it ensures that only the best people are selected
- Economy prospers due to ‘human capital’: workers skills
AO3 - functionalist perspective
Wolf Report 2011, found that high quality apprenticeships are rare and up to 1/3 of 16-19 year olds are on courses that don’t lead to higher education or good jobs
Neoliberalism
Economic doctrine that has had a major influence on educational policy. Argues that state should not provide services like education and welfare. Instead a free market should operate where competition is present in order to drive standards
New Right
Conservative political view that incorporates neoliberal ideas. Believe that state cannot possibly meet the needs of its people, therefore the people are best left to meet their own needs in a free market - favour marketisation of education
New Right similarities with Functionalism
- Both believe that some people are more talented than others
- Both favour meritocratic principles
- Education shouldn’t serve the needs of the economy by preparing young people for work
- Both believe education should socialise pupils into shared values such as competition
AO3 - New Right belief that current education system doesn’t work
- It takes a ‘one size fits all’ approach which disregards local need
- They are unresponsive and inefficient
- Schools waste money and don’t get good results - results in low standards and less qualified workforce
Chubb and Moe’s research in America
Education system in America failed because it has not created an equal opportunity and failed disadvantaged groups.
Research conducted on 60,000 pupils from low income families in 1015 state and private schools found that pupils from low income families do about 5% better in private than state schools.
New Right believe state should have two key roles:
- Impose a framework on schools within which you have to compete e.g. by publishing OFSTED reports and league tables
- State should ensure that schools transmit a shared culture e.g. by imposing a single national curriculum it ensures pupils are socialised into ‘single cultural heritage’ (opposing multicultural education)
AO3 - New Right perspective (two theorists)
Gerwitz and Ball both argue competition between schools benefits the middle classes as they have the culture and economic capital to gain access to the best schools
Marxist perspective
See education based on class division and capitalist exploitation. Society is based on conflict between two classes:
- Capitalist class, bourgeoisie, minority ruling class
- Working class, proletariat, majority subject class
Repressive State Apparatuses (one theorist)
Althusser - maintaining rules by force or threat, e.g. the police, courts, army ect. When necessary they use force or coercion to repress the working class, which keeps bourgeoisie in power
Ideological State Apparatuses (one theorist)
Althusser - maintaining rules by controlling people’s ideas, values and beliefs. Includes religion, family, media and education
Two functions of education (Marxists):
- Education reproduces class inequality by transmitting it from one generation to the next by failing each successive generation of w/c
- Education justifies class inequalities by producing ideologies that disguise the true cause. Function of the ideology is to get workers to accept that their inequality is inevitable
Schooling in Capitalist America: Bowles and Gintis
237 New York high schools - found that they reward students who are submissive and compliant, creativity and independence was penalised:
1. Correspondence principle - close parallels with school and the workplace as their is a hierarchy between head teachers (bosses) and students (workers)
2. Hidden curriculum - lessons that are learnt outside of taught classes e.g. pupils become used to accepting hierarchy and competition
Myth of meritocracy (two theorists)
Bowles and Gintis - argue that evidence suggests the main factor that determines whether someone does well and earns a high income is family and class background, not ability or educational achievement
Willis: Learning to labour
Disagrees with Bowles and Gintis as his study shows that pupils can just resist such attempts to indoctrinate them
- Series of participant observations, studied 12 working class boys
- Found that they form a distant counter culture, where they reject the values of school, school is meaningless and boring, taking part in acts of resistance
- Willis sees a similarity between the boys counter culture and cultures of males on shop floors, both seeing manual work as superior
AO3 - Marxist perspective
Postmodernists criticise Bowles and Gintis as they argue we are now in a post-Fordist economy, which requires schools to produce a very different labour force than one described by Marxists
