2ed

• Social Democratic Perspective

  Promote equality of opportunity.

  Support comprehensive education.

  Less supportive of selective systems.

  If each individual is given opportunity, this will lead to economic growth and prosperity for all.
• Social Democratic perspective criticisms

  Great inequalities remain in educational achievement

  Education has failed to keep up with the needs of industry and does not contribute to economic growth.
• New Right Perspective

  Popular in 1980s.

  Less interested in equality of opportunity.

  Critical in the way the education system was run, arguing that it was inefficient and did not react to wishes of users.

  Cutting the cost of education and incentivising schools to raise standards would be beneficial.

  Support the marketisation of education - running schools more like a business.

  Influenced the 1988 Education Reform Act.
• Education before 1870

  Schools for hundreds of years.

  Only organised education in the 19th Century.

  Before 1870: Public Schools - upper class and Grammar Schools - Middle Class, both were fee paying. Elementary schools run by churches and charaties - working class.

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• Education: 19th - Early 20th Centuries

  1870 - State run elementary schools (5-11) for maximum of 9p.

  1880 - Elementary schools made compulsory up to age 10.

  1891 - Elementary education made free.

  1899 - Local authorities made responsible for secondary education.

  1918 - School leaving age rose to 14.
• Butler Education Act 1944


  Aims to give every pupil a chance to develop talents. Education was reorganised into primary, secondary and further/higher, with the tripartite system introduced.
• The Tripartite System

  Grammar Schools: Academic pupils who passed the 11+ studied to prepare for GCE exams (less than 20%).

  Technical schools: Children with a technical aptitude (5%).

  Secondary modern: Less academic children given a less academic, more practical, basic education (most pupils).
• Parity of Esteem

  Schools should have equal status in buildings, equipment and staffing. This did not work in practice.
• Selection system

  Children are selected by ability. An example of this would be the tripartite system.
• Criticisms of tripartite system

  Intelligence tests may not be the best for testing children - some secondary modern students got better results when allowed to sit GCEs.

  Middle class parents could prepare their children for the test.

  Parents, pupils and employers saw secondary moderns as second rate.

  Failing the 11+ could negatively affect esteem.

  It increased the divide in social class.

  Reproduces gender equality - females needed a higher pass rate to get into grammar schools.
• Social mobility

  The ability of people to change social position throughout their lives.
• Comprehensivisation

  1965 - Labour government asked local authorities to reorganise schools along comprehensive lines - all children went to the same school.

  
  

  By 1979, over 80% of schoolchildren attended comprehensive schools.
• Equality of opportunity

  Main aim of comprehensivisation. All children would have a chance to succeed, attending the same school and recieving the same education. This was supported by social democrats.
• Arguments in favour of comprehensive schools

  Replaced an unfair two-tier system.

  Children of all backgrounds would mix together, making it a more socially inclusive system.

  All children could access the same education and qualifications.
• Arguments against comprehensive schools

  High standards of grammar schools would be lost.

  They could hold back more able children.

  Class inequalities remained.

  Schools used streaming and setting, anyway.
• Vocationalism

  There was relative economic decline in the 1970s, Callaghan concluded that Britain lacked young, motivated workers who lacked skills required for industry. This agreed with the New Right.
• Training Schemes

  Introduced in the early 1980s and provided work based training for young people. They became the apprenticeships of today.
• Vocational qualifications

  Work related course including NVQs, BTECs and OCR Nationals.
• work experience

  Gives pupils work-related skills and experience which will ease the transition from school to work.
• Criticisms of New Vocationalism

  Jobs, not training are needed (Finn)

  Low quality and irrelevant training (Cohen)

  Low status of vocational qualifications

  Secondary schools neglect pupils with vocational aspirations (Birdwell, 2011)
• 1988 Education Reform Act


  Influenced by New Right theory.

  Aimed to reduce state control of education, to make schools compete withe each other and to give more choice to parents.
• 1988 Education Reform Act Policies


  National Curriculum introduced.

  Key Stages introduced.

  SATs introduced at year 2, 6 and 9.

  Parents could choose schools.

  League tables and Ofsted reports were published.
• David Mirian (1993)


  1988 Education Act changes created a 'parentocracy'.
• Stephen Ball et al

  Parents are not equally able to take advantage of choice in the 1988 Education Reform Act.

  
  

  Three groups of parents:

  Privileged/Skilled

  Semi-skilled

  Disconnected
• Further criticisms of the 1988 Education Reform Act


  More money spent on marketing schools.

  More advantageous to middle class parents.

  Too much government control in the NC.

  Test result publication can result in fewer students and funding.

  Educational Triage - schools may focus on students who have a chance of achieving measurable outcomes.
• New Labour Policies

  Retained marketisation, League tables and national curriculum.

  
  

  Liberty and Numeracy Hour

  Homework Clubs

  Education Action Zones

  Specialist Schools

  Academies

  Aim Higher

  Education Maintenance Allowance

  Tuition Fees
• New Labour Diversity of Choice


  'Post-comprehensive era' - Tony Blair

  Schools were encouraged to specialise and 85% had done so by 2008.

  
  

  Academies were also promoted.
• New Labour Compensatory Education


  A strategy which aims to target resources to help the poorest and most disadvantaged pupils.
• New Labour and Vocationalism


  New Deal 1998 - Education and training for people who were out of work for more than six months.

  Broader range of vocational courses.

  Apprenticeships for school leavers were developed further.
• Evaluation of Labour policies

  Postmodernist

  Thompson (1992): Schools should break free of a 'one size fits all' model of schooling.

  
  

  Criticism: Postmodernism exaggerates the extent of diversity in education.
• Criticisms of New Labour

  Whitty (2002): There is a contradiction between Labour's policies to tackle inequality and it's commitment to marketisation.

  
  

  Continued existence of grammar schools and fee paying private schools.
• 2010 Conservative policies


  Education Maintenance Allowance was abolished and replaced with a bursary scheme.

  University fees increased to £9000 per year.

  GCSEs, A-levels and the national curriculum were reformed.

  The government encouraged the creation of free schools.
• Conservatives - Academies

  Independent, state funded education. Funded directly by the government, not via a local authority. They have more freedom.

  
  

  The creation of academies was accelerated under the Conservatives.
• Evaluation of Academies

  Gove: Academies put more power in the hands of head teachers and cut bureaucracy. They improve twice as quickly as other state schools.

  
  

  Critics said it would open the door to privatisation of education.
• Conservatives - Free Schools


  Set up by a group of parents, teachers, charities, businesses, universities, trusts, religious or voluntary groups but funded by the central government.

  
  

  They have increased control over curriculum, teachers pay and conditions and length of school terms and days.
• Free School Evaluation

  Parents can create free schools if they are unhappy with state schools in the local area.

  Critics say that that are divisive, attract the best pupils and are most likely to be created in middle class neighbourhoods.

  Allen (2010): In Sweden, 20% of schools are free schools and only benefit children from highly educated families.

  Some free schools are set up where there are very few pupils and are thus, inefficient.

  Ball (2011): Academies and free schools lead to fragmentation and centralisation.
• Conservatives - Changes to Curriculum

  2013 - New national curriculum with more emphasis on grammar and spelling.

  GCSEs and A Levels were made more linear.
• Conservatives - Tuition Fees

  Increased tuition fees from £3225 to £9000. Higher education became much more market based.
• Conservatives - Compensating for Disadvantaged Pupils


  Pupil premium - Greater resources for schools with more pupils on lower incomes.
• Endogenous Privatisation


  Privatisation within the education system, including:

  Schools manage themselves like businesses.

  Competition between schools for students.

  Teachers on performance-related pay.

  Target setting and school performance league tables.

  Parental choice.