Education

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Class differences in achievement (EXTERNAL)

  • Middle class pupils tend to achieve more than working class pupils. Some explanations focus on factors outside school.
  • These include cultural deprivation - working class pupils are seen as lacking the right attitudes, values, language and knowledge for success.
  • Material deprivation means working class children are more likely to have poorer diets, health and housing, and parents who are less able to meet the hidden costs of schooling.
  • The middle class have more cultural capital. They are better placed to take advantage of the choices offered in the education system.
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Class differences in achievement (INTERNAL)

  • Interactionists argue that schools actively create inequality through labelling and the self fulfilling prophecy, educational triage, streaming and polarisation into pro and anti school subcultures.
  • Conflicts between the school's habitus and pupil's indentities may lead to symbolic violence and self exclusion.
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Ethnic differences in achievement

  • There are achievement differences between ethnic groups e.g. Chinese and Indian pupils tend to do better than average, while black pupils do worse. There are class and gender differences within groups.
  • Some explanations focus on external factors such as cultural deprivation due to unstable family structures or inadequate socialisation.
  • Others argue that the lower class position of many minorities, along with racism in wider society, leads to material deprivation and lower achievement.
  • Other explanations focus on internal factors. These include effects of teachers' racist labelling, the indentities they ascribe to pupils and institutional racism.
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Gender differences in achievement

  • Girls now do better than boys at all stages of education. Some explanations focus on external factors - changes in the family, more employment opportunities for women, impact of feminism, change in girls' ambitions.
  • Others focus on changes within education, such as the influence of feminist ideas via equal opportunities policies and challenges to stereotyping in the curriculum, more female teachers, coursework and league tables.
  • There are gender differences in subject choice. Choices are influenced by early socialisation into gender identities, the image subjects have, peer pressure and career opportunities. Gender differences are more noticeable on vocational than on academic courses.
  • Education also reinforces gender and sexual indentities and hierarchies e.g. through verbal abuse, peer groups, the male gaze, school discipline and double standards of sexual morality.
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The role of education in society

  • Functionalists take a consensus view and see education as performing 3 important functions.. 1) socialisation into the shared culture 2) equipping individuals with specialist work skills for the division of labour 3) selection for work roles. Education is organised on meritocratic principles.
  • The New Right and Neoliberals take a conservtaive view. They believe education can only perform its role effectively if it is organised on market principles rather than run by the state.
  • Marxists take c lass conflict approach. They see education as serving the needs of capitalism. Education is an ideological state apparatus that reproduces and legitimates class inequality through the correspondence principle and myth of meritocracy. Although pupils may restrict indoctrination, their counter school culture may actually prepare them for unskilled labour.
  • Postmodernists argue that the economy has become post-fordist and education is becoming more diverse and flexible.
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Educational policy and inequality

  • Policies can have important effects on inequalities within the education system, policy has gone through 3 main phases since 1944.
  • The first was the tripartite system, with selection at 11+ for either grammar or secondary modern school. Comprehsivisation from 1965 abolished the 11+, all children went to comprehensive schools, but streaming continued.
  • Marketisation from 1988 aimed to create an education market, with parental choice and competition between schools. More recently, there has been some privatisation.
  • Some sociologists see most policies as reproducing and legitimating inequality. Some policies have aimed to deal with gender and ethnic differences in achievement.
  • While marketisation has been the dominant policy since 1988, some policies to reduce inequality have also been introduced.
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Comments

davidwarner

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Poverty and wealth are frequently cited as leading causes of the achievement gap. Children from low-income families usually don't have the same educational opportunities as those from more affluent homes. They're less likely to have books and toys at home, travel, or participate in extracurricular activities. They may not have access to preschool or summer enrichment programs. Affluent parents also tend to be better educated themselves, and many have a clear sense of what it takes to succeed in school. They've been reading aloud since their children were babies, know the importance of homework, and understand the college admission process. Their kids get personalized help with homework, test prep, and college applications. Nowadays students can also visit https://dentmaker.net/ website in order to get their essays written because it has got a team of professional writers who assist students in their college work.

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