1. Chapter 17
Education

2. Chapter Outline Education for a Changing World
Attainment, Achievement, and Equality
The Structure of Educational Institutions

3. Education for a Changing World
Poorer regions of the world face a dire need for universal access to schools; in the more developed regions, serious issues of educational equity need to be addressed.
There is great concern with the need to improve education in order to train new generations of workers.

4. Education
Process by which a society transmits knowledge, values, norms, and ideologies.
In the early history of the United States many were excluded from schools:
children of slaves
Native Americans
the poor
many immigrant groups

5. Why Education is so Important: Sociological Explanations
High stakes
Educational success counts a great deal in explaining success and failure for individuals and entire social groups and communities.
Class and cultural diversity
Schools bring together diverse groups of students, parents, and educators, whose values about learning are often in conflict.

6. Why Education is so Important: Sociological Explanations
Citizen involvement
People expect to influence changes in the institutions they pay for and are involved in.
Rapid change in knowledge
Our expectations about what education can achieve for society changes as scientific and humanistic knowledge changes.

7. Manifest Functions Of Education
Formal education transmits the culture of a society to new generations.
It prepares future generations for appropriate occupational and citizenship roles.
Educational institutions evaluate and select competent individuals.
Education transmits requisite social skills for functioning in society.

8. Latent Functions Of Education
Helps reproduce the existing class structure of societies.
Parents with sufficient wealth can send their children to better public schools by moving to communities that recruit more highly qualified teachers.
It brings young men and women from similar class and cultural backgrounds together in an informal “marriage market.”

9. Theoretical Perspectives on Education
To the functionalists, schools prepare children for participation in adult activities.
Interactionists view the school as a set of behaviors and relationships.
Conflict theorists view education as serving to justify and maintain the status quo.

10. Classrooms
This photo of Tibetan refugee children in a class room in northern India illustrates the similarity of classroom organization in many parts of the world.

11. Global Perspectives on Education
Functionalist Perspective
Issues in Developed Regions
Issues in Developing Regions
How can schools best be organized to carry out their mission?
Are schools devoted to elite or mass education?
How independent are schools from other social institutions, such as mosques and political parties?

12. Global Perspectives on Education
Conflict Perspective
Issues in Developed Regions
Issues in Developing Regions
Do schools promote equal opportunity or reproduce the status quo of inequality?
Do they foster or stifle free inquiry?
Whose children get to go to school?
Do schools allow freedom of thought and critical thinking?

13. Global Perspectives on Education
Interactionism
Issues in Developed Regions
Issues in Developing Regions
How does learning take place in classroom interactions?
What else is being taught in addition to the lessons?
Questions are the same, based on observation of classroom interactions, but with emphasis on how traditional cultures are dealt with in classroom interaction.

14. Thinking Critically
If one of the functions of education is to prepare people to function well in society, won’t they benefit from attending schools that reflect the nation’s ethnic, racial, and class diversity?
Many parents feel the superior education provided by private schools outweighs the benefits of attending diverse public schools.
What do you think?

15. % of Nations Developing Systems of Mass Education, by Decade

16. Educational Attainment in the U.S.
Year
Median Years of School Completed
2000
12.9
1990
1980
12.5
1970
12.2
1960
10.6
1950
9.3
1940
8.6

17. Tracking and Inequality
Number of years of school completed is correlated with income, occupation, prestige, attitudes, and opinions.
Early in the 20th century many schools began using tracking systems to separate higher- achieving students from slower learners.
Research on tracking has found students in lower tracks end up in lower-paid and lower- prestige occupations once they finish schooling.

18. Drop Outs
Research has shown that states that base funding of schools on the results of standardized tests, increase dropout rates.
The main reason for dropping out of school is poor academic performance, but students also drop out because of the demands of work and family roles.

19. Educational Achievement
How much a student learns, measured by mastery of reading, writing, and mathematical skills.
Studies have found that American parents tend to be more positive about their children’s schoolwork and to believe more in the effects of ability than effort.

20. % High School Graduates
White
Black
Hispanic
Year M F
2003
84.5
85.7
79.6
80.3
56.3
57.8
2000 88 77 78 56
1991 80 67 51
1980 71 70 46 44
1970 57 58 32 35 NA
1962 47 50 23 26
1947 33 37 13 15

21. % College Graduates White Black Hispanic Year M F 2003 29.4 25.9 16.7
17.8
11.2
11.6
2000 31 25 14 17 11
1991 19 12 10 9
1980 22 8 6
1970 15 5 4 NA
1962 7
1947 2 3

22. Ability Grouping (“Tracking”) in the U.S. Public Schools

23. International Secondary-School Completion Rates

24. Mathematics Scale Scores of 8th Grade Students, 2003
Country
Average Score
International average
466
Singapore
605
Korea, Republic of
589
Hong Kong
586
Japan
570
Belgium-Flemish
537
Netherlands
536
Estonia
531

25. Mathematics Scale Scores of 8th Grade Students, 2003
Country
Average Score
Hungary
529
Malaysia
508
Latvia
Russian Federation
Slovak Republic
Australia
505
United States
504
Lithuania
502

26. Average Earnings by Level of Education
Without High School
1979
2005
Males
$27,690
$19,676
Females
18,302
14,680
High School Graduate
34,978
25,811
23,041
18,679
College Graduates
55,068
46,914
29,919
30,022

27. Social Class and Educational Attainment and Achievement
Studies find a high correlation between social class and educational attainment and achievement.
Ray Rist claims that the U.S. system of public education is designed to perpetuate social and economic inequality.
Inequality in higher education is primarily a matter of access, or ability to pay.

28. Major Findings at Age 19 in the Perry Preschool Study
Category
Responses
Preschool
No-Preschool
Employed
121
59%
32%
High school graduate
67%
49%
College or vocational training
38%
21%

29. Major Findings at Age 19 in the Perry Preschool Study
Category
Responses
Preschool
No-Preschool
Ever detained or arrested
121
31%
51%
Females: teen pregnancies, per 100 49 64
117

30. % Distribution of Public Schools According to School Condition, by Region

31. Rates of Victimization in U.S. Schools, 1992–2003

32. Quick Quiz

33. 1. Sociologists employing the ________ perspective focus on schools at the micro-level of everyday behavior, for example, centering attention on patterns of communication that transpire in classes, in hallways, and on playgrounds.
conflict
functionalist
interactionist
human ecology

34. Answer: c
Sociologists employing the interactionist perspective focus on schools at the micro-level of everyday behavior, for example, centering attention on patterns of communication that transpire in classes, in hallways, and on playgrounds.

35. 2. Sociologists coming from the ________ perspective stress the role schools play in maintaining inequality and reproducing the class structure.
conflict
functionalist
interactionist
human ecology

36. Answer: a
Sociologists coming from the conflict perspective stress the role schools play in maintaining inequality and reproducing the class structure.

37. 3. The most basic criticism of tracking is that the practice
contributes to the maintenance of social inequality.
significantly improves opinions of high-tracked students about themselves.
significantly improves opinions of lower-tracked students about themselves.
leads to better jobs and higher incomes for those students who are placed in higher tracks.

38. Answer: a
The most basic criticism of tracking is that the practice contributes to the maintenance of social inequality.