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Chapter 11
Education:
What Are We Learning?
Soc 100
Dr. Santos
State of the World’s Education:
An Overview
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For most “education” is an informal
process
Schooling refers to learning skills like
reading and math, in a building via
systematic instruction by a trained
professional
The UNESCO standard:
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6 years of primary school
3 years of intermediate and
secondary school
Formal education is schooling that
takes place in a formal setting with
the goal of teaching a
predetermined curriculum
State of the World’s Education:
An Overview
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Measuring educational
quality:
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Student-teacher ratio
Literacy rates
Mass education systems,
the standardization of
national educational
curricula is a trend
spreading around the
world
Education and Individuals:
Micro-Level Theories
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Social Interaction within
the Classroom: Symbolic
Interaction Perspective
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Young people spend much
time in school or schoolrelated activities
Student therefore becomes
a master status
Education and Individuals:
Micro-Level Theories
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Making Choices in
Educational Settings: Rational
Choice Theory
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If the benefits associated with a
situation outweigh the costs, the
individuals is likely to make the
decision to act in the specified
way to continue receiving
benefits; if costs outweigh
benefits, the individual will seek
other courses of action
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Dropping out of school
Teacher retention
Why Societies Have Education
Systems: Macro-Level Theories
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The Purposes of
Education: Functionalist
Perspective
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Socialization
Training individuals
Promoting Change
Enhancing Personal and
Social Development
Why Societies Have Education
Systems: Macro-Level Theories
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Latent Functions of Education:
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Unintended, unorganized,
informal results of the
educational process
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Keeps children of the streets
Provide young people with a
place to congregate
Foster a “youth culture”
Mate selection market
Weakens parental control over
youths
Moves youth toward
independence
Provides experience in large,
impersonal secondary groups
Why Societies Have Education
Systems: Macro-Level Theories
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Stratification and Education:
Conflict Perspective
Schools used by powerful and
affluent groups to ensure that
their own self interests are met
Schools do not provide equal
educational opportunities for
all children in a society
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This creates the reproduction of
class
Who Does What? Statuses and
Roles in the Educational System
• Students and the Peer
Culture of Schools
– Peer groups formed
– Student peer culture
develops
– Gender dynamics
– Sexual harassment arises
– At risk students appear
Who Does What? Statuses and
Roles in the Educational System
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Teachers: The Front Line
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Serve as gatekeepers
Middle of the educational
hierarchy
Role strain
Fair status and rewards?
The “accountability
movement”
Deprofessionalism
Who Does What? Statuses and
Roles in the Educational System
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Administrators: The Managers
of the School System
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Issue budget reports
Engage in staff negotiations
Hire, fire and train staff
Meet with parents
Manage public relations
Preparing reports
Keep up with new regulations
Oversee discipline
Act as buffers between parents
and teachers when conflicts
arise
The Bureaucratic School Structure
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Weber’s Bureaucratic
Model applies to schools:
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Division of labor
Administrative hierarchy
Specific rules and
procedures
Formalized relations
Rationality
The Informal System: What Really
Happens Inside Schools?
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The informal system of
schooling includes the
unspoken, unwritten, implicit
demands that we must learn
in order to master the system
The hidden curriculum refers to
the implicit demands found in
every learning institution that
students have to learn and
respond to in order to
succeed within the
educational system
Educational Climates of Schools
• The School Climate
• The Classroom Climate
• The Value Climate of
Schools
Power Dynamics and Coping
Strategies in the Classroom
• How rules are enforced
and who has control are
part of the power
dynamics in classrooms
– Teachers and students
develop coping strategies
Power Dynamics and Coping
Strategies in the Classroom
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Conformists: Do the school work
expected to get good grades and
matriculate
Innovators: Cheat of plagiarize to
pass a course or win an academic
contest
Retreatists: Rebel against school
establishments by not conforming or
cooperating
Ambivalence (Ritualists): Get by but
do not exceed at school
Rejection with replacement:
Become a discipline problem or
drop out of school to pursue other
activities
Education and the Social
Institution of the Family
• Family background,
according to many
sociologists, is the single
most important influence
on children’s school
achievement
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Role of parent’s motivation
Importance of social class
Family and work structures
Various social groups have goals
for the schools
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Individuals want to enhance
their status
Community leaders expect
schools to produce youths
who will conform and
contribute to the community
Ethnic and religious groups
want their values and their
worldview represented in the
curriculum
Societal leaders expect that
education train students to be
contributing members of
society
Decision Making at the Meso Level
• Local Level Influences
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Reading material selection
Sex education, churchstate relations, “evolution”
• National Level Influences
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Funding
NCLB
No Child Left Behind
• NCLB requires schools to
administer achievement
tests for accountability
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Schools failing to meet
guidelines are penalized
Tests focus on math and
reading
70 percent of schools are
reducing instructional time
in other subjects to teach
more reading and math
No Child Left Behind
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Positive aspects of NCLB:
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It sets high standards for children
It expects every child to succeed
It helps create consistency between
school systems
Negative aspects of NCLB:
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It overemphasizes testing
It places unrealistic time tables for
schools to meet
It does not provide the necessary
funding
It does not account for or address
the social inequalities that affect
educational performance
Rural and small schools are often
disadvantaged by NCLB
Can Schools Bring about Equality
in Society?
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The goals of equal
educational opportunity,
according to James
Coleman:
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To provide a common
curriculum for all children
regardless of background
To provide that children
from diverse backgrounds
attend the same school
To provide equality within a
given loyalty system
The Coleman Report
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Findings
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Minority students (except AsianAmericans) scored lower on tests
at each level of schooling that
did what students
The majority of children studied
attended segregated schools
with same-race teachers
The socioeconomic makeup of
the school, the home
background, and the
background of other students in
the school made the biggest
difference in students’ school
achievement levels
The Coleman Report
• Findings, continued
– Curriculum and facilities made little
difference in student achievement
– White children had somewhat
greater access to physics,
chemistry, language labs,
textbooks, college curricula, and
better qualified and higher paid
teachers, but the differences were
not very great
• Coleman recommended that
integrating schools would
provide an equal climate for
achievement: magnet schools
Jencks Study
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Findings
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Jencks found that schools alone
cannot create equal opportunity
He found that even if schools
reduce the educational
attainment gap, economic
inequality among adults
continues to exist
Children’s school, home,
community, and physical
environments must all be
equalized for opportunity to be
equalized
Who Gets Ahead and Why?
The Role of Education in Stratification
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Education is a meritocracy, or a
social group or organization where
people are allocated to positions
according to their ability and
credentials
The fact that many children do not
attend school on an equal footing,
questions whether or not a
meritocracy exists
Sources of Inequality
• Testing can place
students according to
achievement and
determining progress
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Importance for tracking
IQ tests
Achievement tests
Bias in tests
Sources of Inequality
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Tracking or Streaming
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Tracking or streaming refers to
placing students in groups based
on their ability levels, and is
another way in which schools
contribute to the stratification
process
Begins in primary school
Tracking correlates directly with
the child’s background and
ethnic group, language skills,
appearance, and other
socioeconomic variables
The negative effects of tracking
can be reduced if the system of
placement is flexible
Sources of Inequality
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School Funding
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In the US, unequal school
spending results from
reliance on local property
taxes as well as state and
federal funds
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This perpetuates existing
inequalities
Educational Trends and Social
Policy Issues
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Education of Girls
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Worldwide, gender
inequality in educational
access is a large problem
In the US, boys are falling
behind in every category
Educational Trends and Social
Policy Issues
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A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for
Educational Reform
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Strengthen high school graduation
requirements
Raise college entrance requirements
Emphasize basic skills
Require a longer school day and
year-round schooling
Improve the training and status of
teachers
Hold educators responsible for
students’ performance
Provide the funds necessary to
improve the educational system
To hold families accountable
Global Issues in Education
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Social economic values of the
society are reflected in
approaches to learning and
in motivation of students
Educational systems also
reflect the economic and
political institutions of a given
society and its place in the
world system
Governments compare their
academic test scores to other
students worldwide
The Future of Education in the
Global System
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Immigration
The “Digital Divide”
The “Virtual University”
The “school-to-work”
transition
Average SAT Scores by Family
Income, 2004