The Function of Education

1. The Function of Education The Functionalist View The Marxist View Andy Walker Learning Online

2. A Functionalist view of Education • Functionalists view education in terms of the “functions” it performs in society. This implies a non conflict view of society • Functionalists believe there are four main functions of education • the transmission of cultural values • social control • economic training • social selection Andy Walker Learning Online

3. Transmission of cultural Values • Sociologists such as Durkheim and Parsons emphasise this role. • Parsons suggests school provides a bridge between family and society at which universal values such as; equality of opportunity, competition, individualism and achievement are promoted. The school therefore transmits the core values of society • Durkheim identifies particular subjects as important in enabling children to feel a sense of belonging to society viz. History, English, Religious education. • Cultural transmission is reinforced by other agencies - family, mass media etc. Andy Walker Learning Online

4. Social Control • Functionalists argue every society has a need to regulate the activities of citizens to some extent • School teaches us about acceptable and unacceptable behaviour • School also teaches a knowledge and acceptance of the political and economic system in which we live Andy Walker Learning Online

5. Economic Training • Functionalist argue that schools produce an adequate supply of sufficiently trained labour for the modern economy • As the economy becomes more complex education must provide a labour force to meet those needs • Thus the “New Vocationalism” of the Conservatives in the 1980s and 1990s was an acknowledgement that perhaps this important function was not being adequately carried out by schools. Andy Walker Learning Online

6. Social Selection • Functionalists such as Davis and Moore suggest that an important function of education is to allocate people to occupations which best suit their abilities • The exam system tests and sorts societies citizens in such a way that society makes best use of its available talents • Both the talented and the less talented end up in useful jobs that contribute to the smooth running of society. Andy Walker Learning Online

7. A critique of the functionalist view • The functionalist position suggests that everyone benefits from the functions carried out by the education system • Conflict theories such as the Marxist approach argue that this is not the case. Rather education is seen as part of the apparatus that legitimises and reproduces societies inequalities and divisions Andy Walker Learning Online

8. Examples of the Marxist approach • Louis Althusser sees the role of education as ideological. • Capitalist values are promoted via the hidden curriculum (informal learning) • Althusser argue working class children never come into contact with ways of thinking that challenge the status quo. Capitalism is thus portrayed as the only possible system • Through rules, routines streaming and selection working class children learn their “place” in society and are conditioned to accept failure Andy Walker Learning Online

9. Bowles and Gintis • In “Schooling in Capitalist society” Bowles and Gintis claim that schools reward conformity over intelligence and achievement • In their study of American high school students they found that the best grades were achieved by hard working obedient children rather than the creative, aggressive and independent ones • They also noted that schooling “corresponds” with boring factory line production to prepare future workers for their lot in society Andy Walker Learning Online

10. Marxists and the new Vocationalism • Marxists have been especially critical of this • Vocational schemes are interpreted as helping legitimise class division because they promote the idea that the middle class receive education whereas the working class receive training • EG Phil Cohen’s critique of YTS Andy Walker Learning Online

11. Conclusion • Functionalism is a non conflict model • Marxism is a conflict model • They are both structuralist in their approach, paying attention to social institutions and structures over individuals • They pay little attention to the interaction between teachers and pupils or how teachers and pupils interpret what is going on in schools Andy Walker Learning Online