Education

• Education


  Acquiring knowledge and learning new skills
• Types of education


  • Formal education
  • Informal education
• Formal education


  Takes place in educational establishments such as schools and universities where people learn knowledge and skills across a wide range of subjects
• Informal education


  Takes place when people develop knowledge and skills by observing what is happening around them in everyday life
• Functions of the education system


  • Serving the needs of the economy
  • Facilitating social mobility
  • Fostering social cohesion
  • Selection and role allocation
• Serving the needs of the economy


  Education has an economic role in teaching the knowledge and skills that future workers will need in a competitive global economy
• Facilitating social mobility


  The education system enables people to move up (or down) the social ladder. Gifted students from disadvantaged backgrounds can achieve qualifications and move into a higher social class
• Fostering social cohesion


  Through subjects such as Citizenship, students identify themselves as British citizens. Schools help to reinforce the 'glue' or the social bonds that unite different people in society
• Selection and role allocation


  The education system works like a sieve, grading students and allocating them to jobs based on their individual merit, abilities and exam results
• What the education system does


  • Serves the interests of the ruling class
  • Reproduces the class structure
  • Breeds competition
  • Secondary socialisation
• Explanation


  1. By passing on ideas and beliefs that benefit the ruling class (for example, that capitalist society is fair and meritocratic), the education system serves ruling class interests

  2. Education appears to reward students fairly based on their individual abilities. However, it actually favours pupils from more privileged backgrounds. Over time, education reproduces (or recreates) the advantages that some social class groups have over others

  3. Through exams and sport at school, students are encouraged to accept values such as competition. This helps to maintain capitalism, which is based on competition

  4. Working-class students learn norms and values at schools that prepare them for their lower position in a capitalist society. For example, they learn to accept hierarchy at school and to obey rules
• Structure of the Education System


  • Early years education
  • Primary education
  • Secondary education
  • Further education (FE)
  • Higher education (HE)
• State nursery schools and nursery classes in primary schools


  Offer free, part-time provision for children aged 3-4
• Most state primary schools


  Cater for girls and boys aged 5-11
• Secondary schools


  • Comprehensive schools
  • Special schools
  • Free schools
  • Academies
• Further education (FE)


  Mainly caters for students aged 16 years and over, courses provided by sixth form and FE colleges
• Higher education (HE)


  Includes universities that provide higher level academic and vocational courses (such as degrees)
• Independent sector


  Fee-paying schools, includes private schools (all fee-charging schools) and public schools (older independent schools, such as Eton and Rugby)
• Around seven per cent of schoolchildren in England attend independent schools
• Advantages of Independent Schools


  • Usually have a lower teacher-student ratio than state schools so students receive more individual attention during lessons
  • Resources and facilities are often better than in state schools
  • Many are selective schools and their ethos stresses academic achievement, exam results tend to be above the national average
  • Parents' input is high in terms of fees, support and expectations
• State Schools


  • Not based on parents' ability to pay fees
  • The intake is more socially mixed (for example, in social class terms) than independent schools
  • May provide a route of upward social mobility for students from low-income families
  • Students do not have to travel far to attend a local state school
• Critics argue that the private sector maintains the privileges of the rich, supporters argue that people have the right to choose between state and private education
• Tripartite System


  The 1944 Education Act set up the tripartite system, aimed to provide children with a free state education based on their individual abilities, school allocation based on 11-plus exam results, children attended secondary modern, secondary technical or grammar schools
• Some local authorities such as Dorset still have grammar schools, with admission based on an entrance exam
• Advantages of the Comprehensive System Compared to the Tripartite System


  • Comprehensive schools are designed to cater for children of all abilities, there is no entrance exam so nobody is labelled a 'failure'
  • Children from different social classes attend the same school, which breaks down social barriers
  • Comprehensives are usually large, so more subjects and facilities are available
• Problems with the Comprehensive System


  • Critics argue comprehensives limit parental choice, students expected to attend closest school regardless of reputation
  • Academic students held back academically in mixed-ability groups, less academic students may struggle
  • Academic working-class children will achieve more at a grammar than a comprehensive school
• Supporters argue that the principle of comprehensive education has not been achieved because comprehensives do not have mixed intakes, e.g. a suburban school's intake is usually middle class, and most comprehensive schools are not fully comprehensive because they have setting in particular subjects
• Alternative Educational Provision


  • Home tuition or home schooling, children taught at home by parents or tutors
  • Concerns about standards of home tuition and impact on children's social development
  • View that students are currently 'schooled' rather than educated, traditional schools repress children and should be abolished
  • Deschooling, which involves self-directed education via learning webs, encourages creativity and real learning
• State schools


  Publicly funded, for example through local councils or government, most must follow the national curriculum
• Independent schools


  Charge fees and do not have to follow the national curriculum
• The issue of grammar schools is still hotly debated among politicians, under Theresa May (a former Conservative Prime Minister) grammar schools were a key part of education policy in 2017, by contrast, the Labour Party opposes grammar schools
• Explanations for class-based differences in achievement


  • Home factors
  • School factors
  • Impact of government reforms
• Economic circumstances and material deprivation


  • Poor housing and overcrowding adversely affect performance at school
  • Students from affluent backgrounds are more likely to have facilities (such as computers and quiet spaces) to help them study at home
  • Many middle-class parents can afford private tuition and property in the catchment areas of good schools
• Parental values and expectations


  • Parents in professional occupations often value educational achievement and expect their children to do well at school
  • Some working-class people may not particularly value education and achieving a high occupational status
  • Working-class children may have less parental interest, support and encouragement than middle-class children
• Cultural deprivation


  Working-class children's home environments may not provide them with the cultural resources and educational experiences (such as family visits to museums or libraries) to perform well at school
• Cultural capital


  • Middle-class parents have the right sort of cultural capital to help their children succeed in schools
  • They know how the education system works and how to work it to their advantage
  • Well-qualified parents are better equipped to help with homework and monitor progress
• Ball, Bowe and Gewirtz: The impact of market forces on parental choice


  • Focuses on the effects that parental choice and competition between schools has on the education system, in particular whether it leads to greater inequality
  • With the publication of examination league tables, schools want to attract 'motivated' parents and 'able' children
  • More resources are directed towards students who are likely to perform well in examinations
  • Middle-class parents are more likely to know how to deal with secondary school choices
  • Working-class parents are more likely to prefer to send their children to local schools
  • Material resources bring advantages in the education market
  • Having the right sort of cultural capital helps parents to play the market
  • Marketisation and educational reform reinforce the advantages of middle-class parents and make education less equal
  • Schools are now more concerned with attracting gifted and advantaged students than with helping disadvantaged ones