Role of education Flashcards
Functionalism: overall view
One of the institutions in society that maintain the shared culture and values that keep society at a equilibrium.
Functionalism: Durkheim
Durkheim sees school as institution that instils:
social solidarity - making individual member feel like they are part of a community.
this is done by the transmitting the same beliefs and values e.g: teaching history of a country encourages children to unite based on a shared heritage.
School is a ‘society miniature’ - preparation for wider society e.g: social interactions with people who aren’t family and friends similar to the work place.
Specialist skills - education teaches individuals the specialist knowledge and skills that they need to play a part in the social division of labour.
Functionalism: Parsons
meritocracy -
Parsons sees school as preparing us to move from the family to wider society because school and society are both based on meritocratic principles.
everyone is given an equal opportunity and individuals receive awards through their own effort and ability.
whereas in the family, status is ascribed e.g: elder son and younger daughter given different roles in the family due to differences in age and sex..
Functionalism: Davis and Moore
sees education as a device for selection and role allocation.
helps discovers people’s abilities and talents and
helps select the appropriate people to do the most important jobs and since they are so important and
its rare for people to attain these talents, they get higher rewards - which also encourages competitiveness.
inequality is necessary to make sure the most talented people fulfil the most important roles in society.
Neo liberalism
believe the state should not fund services such as health care or education
the state shouldn’t dictate someone else’s property or regulate the free market.
treat parent and pupils as consumers and school as a business, competition will drive up standards of schools.
(marketisation)
The New Right
agree with the marketisation of education.
argues that the state dont listen to local needs
i.e parents, pupils. therefore suggestions of improvements are ignored and low achievment increases.
marketisation will limit uniformity, create diversity f choice and and meet the needs of consumers.
The New Right: Chubb and Moe
argue state run education in the US failed because
it failed to meet the needs of disadvantages, failure to produce pupils with the required skills for the economy, private schools are better because hey listen to consumers.
proposed system give families vouchers to spend on a school of their choice and will be the school’s source of income - this will encourage schools to compete and improve standards.
The New Right: Two roles for the state
imposing competition - publishing ofsted reports and league tables
imposing a single national curriculum -socialise people into a singular cultural heritage - single set of cultural values and traditions, therefore opposes multi cultural education.
e.: british history, literature, christian worship everyday
Marxist: Althusser
state consists of two elements which maintains the power of the bourgeoisie:
repressive state apparatus (RSA) - imposing rule by force - e.g: police courts and army.
ideological state apparatuses (ISA) - controlling people’s ideas values and beliefs - education system is one of these alongside media and religion
- reproduces class inequality - failing working class pupils in each generation
legitimises class inequality by disguising its true causes with ideology - persuade workers into accepting their position.
conditions people into not challenging capitalist society
Marxist: Bowels and Gintis study
study of 237 new york high schools
students showing creativity and independence were given lower grades
students showed
characteristics linked to obedience and discipline such as punctuality gained higher grades
stunts and distorts student’s development
Marxist: Bowels and Gintis: correspondence principle and the hidden curriculum
parallels between school and the work
- hierarchies - head teachers or bosses at the top and giving orders to people below to workers or pupils
- schooling takes place in the ‘long shadow of work’
correspondence principles: lessons taught that aren’t direct
- accepting hierarchy and competition
- working for rewards
- cohen - youth training schemes reproduce attitudes and values rather than genuine job skills, lowers aspirations to accept low paid work.
prepares w.c pupils for the role of exploited workers and reproducing class inequality.
The myth of meritocracy:
the legitimation of class inequality
explains and justifies why inequality is fair natural and inevitable. hides the real reason for differences in achievement.
the myth meritocracy used to legitimise the middle class being more successful making it seem they gained it through succeeding in open and fair competition at school.
meritocracy doesn’t exist (equal opportunity to achieve, rewards earned based on effort and ability).
main factor in having high income determined by family income or class background
persuades working class into accepting inequality as legitimate stopping them revolting.
‘poor are dumb’- blaming poverty on the individual rather than capitalism - prepares for exploitation in the work place
Willis study - lads counter culture
- qualitiative method
- particpipant observation and unstructured interviews
- studied counter school culture - 12 working class boys
findings
- resisted school ideology
- scornful to conformists of the education system
- identified with male manual work - which they think makes them superior to girls and conformists
- find satisfaction through making fun of conformists and girls
- have similarities with shop floor manual workers culture
-however prioritising manual work, not getting formal educations because of rebellion and not expecting to find satisfaction in the work place means they are more than qualified to work unskilled jobs that benefit capitalism.
Feminism: overall view
education transmits patriarchal values
Heaton and Lawson (1996) argued that the hidden curriculum taught patriarchal values in schools. They noted traditional family structures in textbooks (along with many other gender stereotypes,
subjects aimed towards specific genders,
gender divisions in PE and sports
the gender division of labour in schools (predominantly female teachers and male managers).
Feminism- banyard
Radical feminist research has also looked at sexual harassment in education and how it is not treated as seriously as other forms of bullying (e.g. Kat Banyard, 2011).
