Topic 2: Social Class and Achievement

Trends in Class and Achievement: Jeffries (2002) (Ability)

Jeffries (2002) studied 11,000 children born in 1958 and found that by age 7, children from poor backgrounds were significantly behind middle-class children in mathematics, reading, and other ability tests. The achievement gap widened over time, reaching its largest by age 33.

Trends in Class and Achievement: The Institute of Education (2000)

The Institute of Education (2000) found that, while more children were born to educated parents in 1970 compared to 1958, children born into poverty continued to underachieve. Childhood poverty made educational attainment more difficult, even for children with similar test scores.

Trends in Class and Achievement: National Children’s Bureau (2003)

National Children’s Bureau (2003) noted that children from poor backgrounds (living on state benefits) were two-thirds less likely to gain at least 5 GCSEs graded A*-C than children from affluent backgrounds.

Trends in Class and Achievement: Joan Payne (2001)

• Joan Payne (2001) found that children from professional and managerial backgrounds were more likely to participate in further education (82%) compared to children from semi/unskilled worker backgrounds (60%).

Trends in Class and Achievement: Connor and Dewson (2001)

Connor and Dewson (2001) found that fewer than one in five young people from lower social class groups participate in higher education.

External Explanations for the Class Gap

• Cultural deprivation – Class differences in norms and values acquired through socialization, attitudes toward education, speech patterns, etc.

• Material deprivation – The physical necessities of life, such as adequate housing, diet, and income.

• Cultural capital – The values and attitudes needed to be successful at school.

Cultural Deprivation Theories: Leon Feinstein

• Leon Feinstein argues that the main reason for working-class children underachieving is their parents' lack of interest in their education.

• Working-class parents are less likely to provide educational toys, activities that stimulate thinking and reasoning skills, or read to their children.

• This leads to intellectual disadvantages when they begin school compared to middle-class children.

Cultural Deprivation Theories: Basil Bernstein

• Basil Bernstein distinguishes between elaborated and restricted speech codes. Working-class children tend to use a restricted code, which is less analytic and more descriptive.

• It is particularistic, assuming the listener shares the speaker's meanings without explaining them.

• In contrast, middle-class children use an elaborate code, which is more analytic and spells out meanings explicitly.

• This code is used in the education system, giving middle-class children an advantage.

Evaluation

• Nell Keddie describes cultural deprivation as a myth, seeing it as a victim-blaming explanation. She argues that working-class children are culturally different, not culturally deprived. They fail because they are disadvantaged by an education system dominated by middle-class values.

Material Deprivation

Material deprivation refers to the lack of physical resources, such as money, room, equipment, etc., which may adversely affect the educational achievement of working-class children.

Smith and Noble: Material Deprivation factors

• Smith and Noble point out the importance of material factors in influencing class differences in educational achievement. For example, having money allows parents to provide educational toys, books, a healthy diet, more space in the home to do homework, greater opportunities for travel, and private tuition.

• Research by Warwick University found that many students face selection or admission by mortgage, where wealthier middle-class parents can move into the catchment area of good schools, leaving less successful schools full of working-class students.

Gerwitz: Material Deprivation factors (hot)

• Gerwitz found that differences in economic and cultural capital lead to class differences in how far parents can exercise choice in secondary school selection. Professional middle-class parents tend to be privileged skilled choosers who understand how the schools’ admission procedures work and can use this ‘hot’ knowledge to access the best schools.

Cultural Capital- Bourdieu

• Pierre Bourdieu uses the concept of cultural capital to explain why middle-class students are more successful. He defines cultural capital as the knowledge, attitudes, values, language, tastes, and abilities of the middle class.

• Bourdieu sees middle-class culture as capital because it can be translated into wealth and power, giving an advantage to those who possess it.

• The culture, knowledge, and language of the school align more closely with middle-class culture, so middle-class students have an in-built advantage.

• On the other hand, children of working-class parents experience a cultural deficit. They soon realize that the school and teachers attach little importance to their experiences and values, which can hinder their educational success

Internal Explanations for the Class Gap

1. Labelling

2. Banding, setting, and streaming

3. Marketisation and selection policies

4. Pupil subcultures

5. Pupils’ class identities and the school

1. Labelling:

• Rist (kindergarden)

• Gillborn and Youdell

• Result of this?

• In a study of an American kindergarten, Rist found that it was not ability that determined where each child was seated, but the degree to which the children conformed to the teacher's own middle-class standards. In other words, the kindergarten teacher was evaluating and labelling pupils based on their social class, not their demonstrated abilities.

• Gillborn and Youdell found that teachers are more likely to see middle-class students as having the ability to enter higher-level exams. This is based more on teachers’ perceptions of what counts as ability, rather than students’ actual abilities. The result is discrimination against many working-class students who are denied the opportunity to attempt to obtain higher grades.

• This research suggests that teachers tend to expect more from middle-class students and are more likely to convey their expectations and act according to these expectations. This creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, where teachers' expectations of students' future behaviour and attainment tend to come true.

Evaluation of Labelling Theory (Cruder P Fuller E)

• Cruder versions of labelling theory are deterministic, suggesting the inevitability of failure for those with negative labels attached. For example, Margaret Fuller found that the black girls in her study resisted being labelled as failures by devoting themselves to schoolwork in order to be successful.

• Marxists criticise labelling theory for ignoring the wider structures of power within which labelling occurs. They argue that labels are not simply the result of teachers’ individual prejudices, but stem from the fact that teachers work in a system that reproduces class divisions.

2. Banding, Setting, and Streaming:

• Ball, Hargreaves, and Lacey

• Campbell (2001)

• Stephen Ball (2003)

• Studies by Ball, Hargreaves, and Lacey examined the effects of ability grouping in secondary schools. They generally found that middle-class students were placed in higher groups, while working-class students were placed in the lower groups.

• Teachers tend to have lower expectations of working-class students, deny them access to higher-level knowledge, and enter them for lower-level examination tiers.

• Campbell (2001) argues that subject setting advantages middle-class students in the top sets because research evidence suggests their attainment increases. However, working-class students in the bottom sets do not experience the same improvement.

• Stephen Ball (2003) refers to setting as "social barbarism" because it allows well-off parents to separate their children from others they consider socially and intellectually inferior. He points to overwhelming research evidence that shows grouping by ability increases social class inequalities among children.

3. Marketisation and Selection Policies:

• Marketisation policies

• Bartlett

• Gilborn and Youdell

• Marketisation policies and greater use of selection have created a competitive environment among schools. Middle-class students are seen as more desirable recruits due to their better exam results, while working-class students are viewed as 'liability students' and barriers to schools' efforts to climb the league tables.

• According to Bartlett, marketisation leads to popular schools 'cream-skimming' higher ability students and 'silt-shifting' lower ability students from disadvantaged backgrounds into unpopular schools that must accept them for funding reasons.

• Gilborn and Youdell argue that the publication of school league tables creates an 'A*-C economy,' where schools channel most of their efforts into students likely to achieve 5 or more GCSEs at grades A*-C. This leads to educational triage, in which working-class students are viewed as lower ability and thus 'hopeless cases,' contributing to a self-fulfilling prophecy and failure.

What is a subculture

• A subculture is a group of pupils who share similar values and behaviour patterns. Subcultures emerge in response to labelling (e.g., differentiation – where teachers categorise more able and less able students, with more able students given higher status).

What is Polarisation

• Polarisation refers to how pupils respond to categorisation by moving towards two extremes: the pro-school subculture vs. the anti-school subculture.

4. Pupil Subcultures

• Lacey’s study and Hargreaves

• Stephen Ball’s

• Lacey’s study and Hargreaves' study explore how pupils develop subcultures based on teachers’ labelling.

• Stephen Ball’s study of a mixed-ability comprehensive school suggests that when schools abolish banding and setting, there was less polarisation and a reduction in anti-school subcultures. However, a class difference in educational attainment persisted, suggesting that teachers continue to categorise pupils and the effects of self-fulfilling prophecy still occur.

5. Pupils' Class Identities and the School:

• Habitus

• Symbolic Capital and Symbolic Violence

• Class Identity and Self-Exclusion

• Louise Archer

?

Habitus

• The habitus refers to the values, dispositions, and lifestyle choices that individuals acquire through their social background. It plays a role in how students interact with the educational system.

Symbolic Capital and Symbolic Violence

• Symbolic capital refers to the resources and recognition individuals gain from cultural or social markers, such as class, taste, and appearance.

• Symbolic violence occurs when a dominant group imposes its values, making others feel inferior. Schools, which are typically middle-class institutions, provide symbolic capital to students who possess middle-class values and cultural capital, while devaluing working-class values.

How does class identity impact educational success?

• For working-class students, to be successful in education, they may feel forced to abandon their class identity, which is at odds with the school’s values.

How do Nike identities relate to marginalisation in education?

• Nike identities, identified by Louise Archer (2010), describe a subculture that rejects the educational system due to a clash between their lifestyle and the school’s middle-class values.

• These identities contribute to both the marginalisation of working-class students in education and their active choice to distance themselves from a system they feel doesn't represent them.