AQA A Level Sociology Study Guide: Education

Consensus Theories of Education

Functionalists argue that the education system performs three primary functions for society:

• Secondary Socialisation: Transmitting universal norms and values.
• Role Allocation: Sifting and sorting individuals into appropriate jobs.
• Providing Necessary Skills: Equipping the workforce for the economy.

Durkheim and Education

Durkheim identifies the school as a miniature society that bridge the gap between the family and wider society.

• Secondary Socialisation: While the family provides primary socialisation based on particularistic values, the education system delivers secondary socialisation based on universalistic values. This ensures individuals become functional members of a modern society where they know how to behave according to shared norms.
• Social Solidarity: Education instills a sense of belonging to a broader community. Learning history, for instance, allows children to see themselves as part of a national identity, encouraging collaboration for common goals.
• Social Rules: Schools teach pupils how to abide by a set of formal rules that apply to everyone regardless of personal relationships. This limits deviance by teaching self-discipline and the consequences of punishment.
• Specialist Skills: In modern industrial societies characterized by a complex division of labour, schools provide the technical knowledge and principles required for specific economic roles, such as working on an assembly line.
• Mechanical vs. Organic Solidarity: In simpler agrarian societies, socialisation occurred face-to-face in the family (mechanical solidarity). In larger, complex industrial societies (organic solidarity), an organized education system is essential to teach the shared values of the broader society.

Parsons on Education

Influenced by Durkheim, Parsons focuses on how education facilitates meritocracy.

• Meritocracy: A system where rewards (jobs and pay) are allocated based on talent and achievement rather than social status. Educational success is based on achieved status (effort and ability) rather than ascribed status (family background).
• Sifting and Sorting: Education acts as a mechanism to identify the most talented individuals. Those who are intelligent and hardworking attain higher qualifications, which grants them access to the most demanding and rewarding social roles.

Davis and Moore on Education

Davis and Moore further developed functionalist views on role allocation:

• Essential Inequality: They argue that social stratification (inequality) is functional and necessary. To ensure the most important roles are filled by the most capable people, society must offer unequal rewards (higher pay and status) as an incentive for individuals to put in extra effort.
• Competition: Meritocracy relies on intense competition where the best rise to the top through the education system.

New Right Views on Education

The New Right shares the functionalist belief that education should be meritocratic and socialise pupils into shared values, but they argue the current state education system fails to do this effectively.

• State Failure: They argue that centralized state control and policies aiming for equality (like "sports days where everyone gets a prize") stifle drive and ambition.
• Marketisation: For education to improve, it must be competitive. Schools should compete for "customers" (parents), which will drive up standards.
• Choice and Parentocracy: Putting parents in control ensures schools reflect mainstream values rather than the "radical" or "left-wing" ideologies of local authorities.
• National Identity: The New Right believes schools should instill a sense of national pride and patriotism, often through the teaching of traditional history.

Evaluation of Consensus Theories

• Marxism: Marxists argue that these theories ignore power. They believe there are no neutral norms; instead, the education system spreads ruling-class ideology (the "myth of meritocracy") to make inequality seem fair. Bowles and Gintis found that academic success is more dependent on social class and gender than IQ.
• Postmodernism: They argue that contemporary society is too diverse and multicultural for a single value consensus to be possible or desirable.
• Ineffective Training: Some sociologists argue that schools do not actually provide adequate training for work, as most specific skills are learned via in-work training.
• Individualism vs. Solidarity: Hargreaves ($1982$) argues that schools encourage competition and individualism (treating collaboration as "cheating") which is the opposite of social solidarity.
• New Right Critiques: Critics of the New Right argue that the losers in a competitive market are the children themselves. Furthermore, private schools often succeed because of selective intake and wealthy parents rather than market principles alone.

Conflict Theories of Education

Louis Althusser: Ideological State Apparatus

Althusser argues that the bourgeoisie maintain power through two types of state apparatus:

• Repressive State Apparatus (RSA): Coercive power such as the police and army.
• Ideological State Apparatus (ISA): Institutions like schools that spread ideology to ensure the proletariat stay in a state of false class consciousness.
• Function of Schools: Schools prepare working-class pupils to accept exploitation. This happens through the formal curriculum (e.g., teaching a patriotic version of history that ignores British involvement in the slave trade or famines) and the hidden curriculum (teaching hierarchy and respect for authority).

Bowles and Gintis: The Correspondence Principle

Bowles and Gintis identified a "correspondence" between the structures of school and the workplace in capitalist society. They famously stated that "work casts a long shadow over school."

Paul Willis: Learning to Labour ($1977$)

Willis provided a neo-Marxist critique of Bowles and Gintis. He conducted a case study of "the Lads," a group of working-class boys who formed an anti-school subculture.

• Characteristics of "The Lads": They inverted the values of the school. Academic success was frowned upon, while "mucking about" and "having a laff" were rewarded. They mocked conforming students as "ear'oles."
• Outcome: Ironically, their rebellion prepared them for manual labour. By learning to cope with the boredom of school through humor and boundary-pushing, they developed the coping mechanisms needed for the tedium of factory work. This ensures the reproduction of an exploitable workforce.

Pierre Bourdieu: Cultural Capital and Habitus

Bourdieu argued that the wealthy maintain power through cultural assets as well as money.

• Habitus: The culture or worldview (habits, skills, ways of thinking) associated with a specific social class.
• Cultural Capital: Middle-class parents possess knowledge, behaviors, and attitudes that give their children an advantage in the education system. Teachers, who usually have a middle-class habitus, perceive this cultural capital as intelligence and apply positive labels to these pupils.
• Symbolic Violence: Working-class habitus is often interpreted negatively or as being "less academic," leading to the reproduction of inequality.
• Language Codes: Basil Bernstein argued that middle-class students use the elaborate code (formal, grammatically complex language), while working-class students use the restricted code (informal, simplistic, colloquial). Because textbooks and exams are written in the elaborate code, middle-class students have an built-in advantage.

Feminist Views on Education

Feminists argue that education transmits patriarchal values rather than neutral ones.

• Liberal Feminists: Acknowledge significant progress ($1970$ Equal Pay Act, $1976$ Sex Discrimination Act) and note that girls now outperform boys. However, they still point to gendered subject choices and stereotypes.
• Radical Feminists: Argue the system is still fundamentally patriarchal. They highlight the marginalisation of women in textbooks, sexual harassment in schools (Kat Banyard, $2011$), and the fact that men still hold most senior management positions in schools.
• Sue Sharpe ($1994$): Her study "Just Like a Girl" compared priorities of working-class girls in the $1970s$ and $1990s$. In the $1970s$, priorities were "love, marriage, husbands, children, and then jobs." By the $1990s$, priorities had switched to "careers" and being able to support themselves.

Differential Achievement by Social Class

The Achievement Gap

Statistics show a persistent gap based on social class. In $2014/15$, $60\%$ of pupils not eligible for Free School Meals (FSM) achieved $5$ GCSEs at $A*-C$, compared to only $33\%$ of those eligible.

External Factors (Out-of-School)

• Material Deprivation: The inability to afford basic resources. This includes poor diet (leading to illness and absence), lack of a quiet study space, no internet, or the need to work part-time jobs. Many working-class children cannot afford private tuition or educational trips.
• Cultural Deprivation:
  • Parental Interest: J.W.B. Douglas ($1964$) argued that middle-class parents take more interest in their children’s education and push them harder.
  • Gratification: Barry Sugarman ($1970$) argued the working class seek immediate gratification (leaving school to earn money), whereas the middle class practice deferred gratification (investing in education for long-term rewards).
  • Cultural Capital: As discussed by Bourdieu, the middle class possess the "right" cultural attitudes and knowledge to succeed.

Internal Factors (In-School)

• Labelling: Howard Becker found that teachers label students. The "ideal pupil" is often middle-class. Working-class boys are often labelled as "trouble," which can lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy of failure.
• Streaming and Banding: Working-class pupils are more likely to be placed in lower streams. This acts as an institutional label, lowering their self-esteem and limiting their access to higher-level knowledge.
• Language Codes: Bernstein’s elaborate vs. restricted code puts working-class students at a disadvantage when deciphering exam questions.

Differential Achievement by Gender

Key Statistics

• The gap between girls and boys reaching $5$ GCSEs at $A*-C$ was nearly $9\%$ in favor of girls in $2016$.
• Girls consistently achieve more $A*$ and $A$ grades than boys, though boys narrowed the gap at A-level in $2017$ (potentially due to the move back to linear exams).
• Boys are twice as likely as girls to fall behind before school even begins (Save the Children, $2016$).

Explanations for Female Success

• Changes in Women's Aspirations: Supported by Sue Sharpe’s research, girls now prioritize careers over families.
• Feminisation of Education: Tony Sewell ($2006$) argues that schools have become more female-friendly, focusing on skills like coursework and verbal communication where girls traditionally excel.
• Teacher Attention: Swann and Graddol found that while teachers spend more time with boys, the interactions with girls are more educational, whereas interactions with boys are often about discipline.
• Policy Initiatives: Programs like GIST (Girls Into Science and Technology) and WISE have encouraged girls into traditionally male subjects.

Explanations for Male Underachievement

• Crisis of Masculinity: The decline of traditional manufacturing jobs ("breadwinner" roles) has led to a lack of motivation among working-class boys.
• Laddish Subcultures: Peer pressure often forces boys to reject academic success to maintain a masculine identity.
• Lack of Male Role Models: Only a small percentage of primary school teachers are male.

Differential Achievement by Ethnicity

Performance Statistics ($2014$)

• Chinese pupils: $74\%$ achieved $5 \text{ } A*-C$ at GCSE.
• Indian pupils: $73\%$.
• White British pupils: $56\%$.
• Pakistani pupils: $51.4\%$.
• African-Caribbean pupils: $47\%$.
• Roma/Gypsy and Irish Traveller groups: Lowest at $8\%$ and $14\%$ respectively.

External Factors

• Language: While not a barrier for long-term residents, first-generation immigrants may face initial hurdles. However, Driver and Ballard ($1981$) found that by age $16$, Asian children were as fluent as their peers.
• Family Structure: High parental expectations in Indian and Chinese families (Archer and Francis, $2006$) contribute to success. Conversely, the high incidence of single-parenthood in black families is sometimes blamed for underachievement due to the absence of a male role model, though Mirza argues black mothers provide strong positive role models for girls.

Internal Factors

• Labelling and Racism: Gillborn ($1990$) identified the "myth of the black challenge," where teachers label black male students as aggressive or threatening, leading to negative treatment.
• Ethnocentric Curriculum: The curriculum is often centred around European history, Christian holidays, and European languages, marginalising non-Western cultures.
• Institutional Racism: Wright ($1992$) argues that school policies (like excluding certain religious dress) can unintentionally discriminate.
• Heidi Safia Mirza ($1992$): In her study "Young, Female and Black," she found that black girls were often pro-education but anti-school. They worked hard to prove racist teachers wrong (a self-refuting prophecy).

Educational Policies

1944 Education Act (The Butler Act)

• Tripartite System: Introduced academic selection at age $11$.
• The 11+ Exam: A test identifying a child's "intelligence type."
• Three School Types:
  • Grammar Schools: For those with "academic" intelligence ($20\%$ of pupils). Provided a path to university.
  • Technical Schools: For "technical" intelligence (engineering). Very few were ever built (less than $3\%$ of pupils).
  • Secondary Moderns: For "practical" intelligence. In reality, these were for those who failed the $11+$. They lacked sixth forms.
• Criticism: The system reproduced class inequality. Middle-class parents could afford private tutors for the $11+$. The test was ethnocentric and favored middle-class cultural capital.

Comprehensivisation ($1960s-1970s$)

• Removed the $11+$ in most areas. All children in an area attended the same mixed-ability school.
• Aims: Equality of opportunity and outcome.
• Criticism: Selection still happened inside the school via "banding." It led to "selection by mortgage," where schools in wealthy areas were better than those in poor areas.

1988 Education Reform Act

Introduced by Margaret Thatcher, heavily influenced by New Right ideas of marketization.

• National Curriculum: Standardized what was taught in all schools.
• SATs: Standardized testing at $7$, $11$, and $14$.
• League Tables: Public lists of school performance to allow parents to compare schools.
• Formula Funding: Schools received money per pupil they attracted, encouraging competition.
• Parentocracy: The idea that parents are now the "consumers" of education.
• OFSTED ($1992$): National inspections to monitor standards.

New Labour Policies ($1997-2010$)

• Academies: Originally introduced to help failing schools by moving them from local authority control to central government funding with private sponsorship.
• SureStart: Centres providing health and parenting advice to disadvantaged families to reduce the achievement gap before school begins.
• EMA (Educational Maintenance Allowance): Payments of up to $\text{£}30$ a week to low-income students to encourage them to stay in education post-$16$.
• Education Action Zones: Targeting extra funding at deprived areas.

Recent Policies and Privatisation

• Free Schools ($2010$): Set up by parents, teachers, or businesses, funded by the government but not under local authority control. A Swedish concept borrowed by Michael Gove.
• Privatisation: Ball and Youdell identify Endogenous (privitisation from within, like schools advertising and competing) and Exogenous (private companies running exams, providing catering, or managing supply teachers).
• Pupil Premium ($2010$): Extra funding for schools specifically for each pupil from a low-income household.

Globalisation

• PISA Rankings: The OECD publishes global league tables. The UK often ranks behind Singapore, Hong Kong, and Finland (e.g., in $2016$, UK was $16^{th}$ in science, $22^{nd}$ in reading, and $27^{th}$ in maths).
• Policy Borrowing: Governments look at high-performing countries to copy their methods (e.g., the Swedish model for Free Schools).
• The Global Village: The UK economy now depends on the service sector rather than manufacturing, needing higher-skilled workers to compete globally.