educational policy in Britain before 1988

the tripartite system, comprehensive school

tripartite system (bipartite)

• from 1944 education began to become influenced by meritocracy.

• the 1944 Educational Act brought in the tripartite system, where children were to selected and allocated to one of three different types of secondary schools.

• identified through the +11 exams

• grammar: offered an academic curriculum and access to non-manual jobs and higher education, mainly middle class who passed the +11 exam.

• secondary: offered a non-academic practical curriculum and access to manual work for pupils who failed the +11 exam, mainly working class.

• technical existed in few areas only.

• the tripartite system reproduce class inequality by channeling two social classes into two different types of school that offer unequal opportunities.

• the system also legitimises inequality through the ideology that ability is inborn, however children’s environment greatly affects their chances of success.

what act brought the tripartite system ?

the education act 1944

rather than producing meritocracy, what did the tripartite system produce instead and how ?

produce inequalities by splitting two social classes into two different types of schools that offered unequal opportunities.

‘ the tripartite system also _________ inequality through the ideology that ability is _____.’

fill in the blank

• legitimises/justifies

• inborn

The comprehensive school system

• introduced 1965.

• aim to overcome the divide of the tripartite system and make education more meritocratic.

• grammar and secondary was abolished and replaced with comprehensive and pupils within the area would attend.

• local authority have the decision whether to ‘go comprehensive’ or not, because of this, grammar-secondary schools sill exist in many areas.

two theories of the role of comprehensives

Marxism vs Functionalism

they see education very differently

• functionalists see it as fulfilling essential functions such as social integration and role allocation

• Marxists see it as serving the interests of capitalism by reproducing class inequalities.

• functionalists argue that comprehensives promote social integration by bringing children of different social class together in one school.

• functionalist see the comprehensive system as more meritocratic because it gives pupils more time to develop and display skill which the tripartite doesn’t.

• Marxist argue that comprehensives are not meritocratic, reproduce class inequality through streaming and labelling, denying working class equal opportunity.

ur done next is marketisation