Power in Education
This section addresses the matter of power in education. Since education is a larger context in which schools and classrooms are the microelements, understanding the way power residing in the education system can uncover the correlation between power on educational macro and micro scale, education, school and classrooms. To prevail the power of education, the starting points for this section discussion is the function or the capabilities of schools. A section following after looks at the bigger picture of the education structure wherein school, educational institutions and classrooms constituted. These reviews are subsequently followed by another section discussing about teachers’ position within the multi-dimensional entity as such of an education. Vietnamese context and teachers are also included in this section as a backdrop for the subsequent chapters.
General View
“No parents beyond this point” – this apparently normal phrase conveys much more than just telling the parents not to pass certain points to the interior of a school. It is, on the contrary, reflecting the internalised ideology that signifies the dichotomy between school and the outside world (Vincent, 1996c) .
“[s]chools as island of professional expertise, of calm, order and learning, situated apart from their teeming, disorganized, unknowing surroundings.” (Vincent, 1996c:01)
Schools are the places about which people generally hold a belief that growing and learning activities take place (Ben-Peretz, 2012). For centuries, society and family put their trust in the education for their offspring; however, the concept of school is not as simple as how it is conventionally perceived.
What schools really do?
The first step to take a closer lo...
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... ‘in principle’ and happen ‘episodically’. So the question is where exactly power relation in school and education come from? The answer for this question lies essentially on what have been discussed earlier on the schools’ functions. The functions that embedded within schools are prominently linked with and help to prevail schools’ power in a more reasonable and systematic way. The interpretation of school’s power is drawn from several following aspects.
From a perspective of parents and the public, the power of school is its capability to educate and secure degree end for its candidates. Acting as ‘sorting devices’ and classify agents, attending and completing schooling are considered a necessary move that every child to take in order to be accepted in the work force. Schools are constantly seen “as a filter between the home and the labor market” (Apple, 1982:44).
Juveniles are being taught that in order to have a nice car, branded cloths and the house of their dreams, by getting into an expensive mortgage, they have to be an employee of a huge corporation. In addition, they have to undergo to a prestigious school, study hard, have excellent grades in order to become popular and respectable in the world. However, many people would not become those super leaders, but these majority of people have a great role in the capitalism society of the US. As Gatto says, “We buy televisions, and then we buy the things we see on the television. We buy computers, and then we buy the things we see on the computer. We buy $150 sneakers whether we need them or not, and when they fall apart too soon we buy another pair” (38). Such results are in part of a wrong education that teenagers have received trough many decades. In addition, Gatto highlights that modern educational system has been working in a six basic functions methods that makes the system strong and unbreakable: The adjustable function, indulge students to respect authorities. The integrating function, which builds the personality of the students as similar to each other as possible. The diagnostic and directive function, which allows a school to set permanent scholar grades in order to determinate his or her future role in society. The differentiating function, which gives to the student a good education and after his or her role is diagnosed, they prevent any educational progress. The selective function, function that the system has used to prevent academic growth for the non-selected students. The propaedeutic function, which works in the selection of specific groups of intellectual adults to keep perpetuating the system all over again making it a continuous sequence. (Gatto 34). Gatto’s facts revealed the survival of the educational system for decades,
The average human would think that going to school and getting an education are the two key items needed to make it in life. Another common belief is, the higher someone goes with their education, the more successful they ought to be. Some may even question if school really makes anyone smarter or not. In order to analyze it, there needs to be recognition of ethos, which is the writer 's appeal to their own credibility, followed by pathos that appeals to the writer’s mind and emotions, and lastly, logos that is a writer’s appeal to logical reasoning. While using the three appeals, I will be analyzing “Against School” an essay written by John Taylor Gatto that gives a glimpse of what modern day schooling is like, and if it actually help kids
John Taylor Gatto, who was a teacher at the public school for twenty-six years, and the writer of the essay “Against School” that first appeared in Harper’s magazine in 2001, censures and blames the American public school’s educational system in his argumentative essay with various convincible supporting ideas. Gatto argues that the demands of public education system’s schooling are essential problems in “Against School”. Gatto shows some positive examples of the educating without forced schooling and shows models of the ‘success without forced modern schooling’. Indeed, the writer insists that historically forced schooling is not related to intellectual and financial success in American history. James Bryant Conant, who was the twenty-third
Within the walls of our educational system lie many adverse problems. Is there a solution to such problems? If so, what is the solution? As we take a look at two different essays by two different authors’ John Gatto and Alfie Kohn, both highlight what’s wrong within our educational system in today’s society. As John Gatto explores the concept if schools are really as necessary as they’re made out to be; Alfie Kohn analyzes the non-importance of letter grades within our schools. Although both essays are fairly different, they still pose some similarities in relation to the educational system in today’s society.
School is not compulsory and parents are not bound by law to send their children there. Parents are bound by law to educate their children but that doesn’t necessarily have to be in school (Mountney 13). Making sure that children can read, write, and learn basic skills is a task that parents should support. Children can learn different matters now, compliments of the internet. Public libraries and local museums Students are engaged in learning because the curriculum is selected specifically for each individual and is based on interests and needs (Butler
However there are people who believe that the process of schooling is a way of drilling children to become obedient servants to the government. Gatto’s article highlights children are part of an economic scheme which the government has concealed about the “true” meaning of education. Trying to illustrate how schooling works Gatto presumed, “Our schools are…factories in which the raw products (children) are to be shaped and fashioned…And it is the business of the school to build its pupils according to the specifications laid down” (148). Gatto saw how the government is trying to standardize education by telling what teachers are supposed to teach each child in order to design the children to their specifications. Children are obligated to listen to every lecture and lesson, as the teacher’s job is to follow each standard the government provides. Anyon illustrated in his book how children in different social classes were taught by different techniques, due to the fact that some children were being trained to listen and others were drilled to create decisions. Documenting how the children were taught in the working class Anyon shows how children were being drilled to constantly listen to orders by stating, “The four fifth grade teachers observed in the working-class schools attempted to control classroom time and space by making decisions without consulting the children and without explaining the basis for their decisions” (169). Anyon recognized more than one fifth grade teacher taught their students in the way supervisors would treat blue-collared workers, by constantly telling them what to do. The children were told what to do and how to do it, but they were never asked if they knew other ways to do the same action, as if the child’s input didn’t matter. Anyon
We live in a society where we are surrounded by people telling us that school/education and being educated is the only way to succeed. However, the school system is not up to the standards we want it to uphold. There are three issues we discuss the most which are the government, the student, and the teacher. In John Taylor Gatto 's essay “Against School”, we see the inside perspective of the educational system from the view of a teacher. In “I Just Wanna Be Average”, an essay written by Mike Rose, we hear a student 's experience of being in a vocational class in the lower level class in the educational system when he was supposed to be in the higher class.
Now that public schools were commonplace in America, they needed to be altered to increase knowledge of students leaving them. Through reforms and political events, schools became not only a place for learning math and English, but also a place to learn other skills that will help students obtain jobs once they graduate. School was becoming essential rather than optional.
In his essay “Against School,” John Taylor Gatto illustrates his view point that the American population would be better off by managing their own education. He compares the school system to the concept of boredom; that students as well as teachers are victims of the long ago adopted Prussian educational system: “We suppress our genius only because we haven’t yet figured out how to manage a population of educated men and women. The solution, I think, is simply and glorious. Let them manage themselves.” In other words, Gatto believes that the main reason for the existence of schooling consists in that it trains our children to be obedient citizens who can’t think on their own. His point is that as a society we cut off the intelligence and creativity
Education is an institution that parents want to control as a way to insure/provide their children with the best education possible. Parent control/choice has slowly regressed from the colonial era where they could choose not only the school their child attended but also the textbooks used and the curriculum taught (McDonald 2001). Parents still obtain the right to choose the school that best tailors their child’s special uniqueness and educational needs, but due to social diversities and expansions parents have many factors that they now must take into consideration before choosing the best kind of school for their child (Russell 2001). Complexity, diversity, and financial status are some of the main denunciating factors many parents look into when choosing a public or private school for their child.
The Quality of a child’s education often either limits or opens up a world of opportunities. Those who study the purpose of public education and the way it is distributed throughout society can often identify clear correlations between social class and the type of education a student receives. It is generally known by society that wealthy families obtain the best opportunities money can buy. Education is a tool of intellectual and economical empowerment and since the quality of education is strongly influenced by social class, a smaller portion of the American population obtains the opportunities acquired from a top notch education. Many people believe that educational inequalities are perpetuated from the interests of specific classes, but some researchers like John Gatto believe that there are even stronger social forces in play. In the essay “Against Schools” the author John Gatto presents three arguments: (1) that are educational system is flawed, (2) that the American educational system is purposely designed to create a massive working class that is easy to manipulate, and (3) alternative teaching methods should be applied to teach children to think for themselves. In this essay I will be summarizing and relating each of these arguments to other educational essays. Also, I will be discussing the strengths and weaknesses of the author’s argument.
They are not only its inert or consenting target; they are always also the elements of its articulation” (Foucault, “Two Lectures” 34). Power may take various forms, all of which are employed and exercised by individualsand unto individuals in the institutions of society. In all institutions, there is political and judicial power, as certain individuals claim the right to give orders, establish rules, and so forth as well as the right to punish and award. For example, in school, the professor not only teaches, but also dictates, evaluates, as well as punishes and rewards.
The purpose of schooling can be highly subjective, but some core purposes have persisted through time. These core values are important and will continue to be the driving force of education. Unfortunately, many times the idealized purposes of education are vastly different from the reality. Our education system is not perfect but it is constantly improving. Despite its flaws, our current school system does teach our children many important skills, both socially and academically. School gives our children a chance to reach their full potential and succeed in life. As our culture changes, so will our purposes behind educating our children.
In 1971, a philosopher by the name of Ivan Illich published a book called “Deschooling Society” – a critique of education in modern societies which called for the imminent disestablishment of schools. His radical ideas highlighted the institutionalisation of schools and he advocated self-motivated learning that could only occur outside of formal school boundaries. Many dismissed his thoughts as impractical or too radical for his time and while schools did not in fact disappear, Illich put forward ideas that still hold some relevance to this day (Hart, 2000). This essay will discuss what Illich sees as the aims of education, how he thinks these can be achieved and what the outcome would be if these ideas were applied to the present-day education system.
Having explained the reason most children have become disheartened at the thought of school, I now turn my attention to the students who do realize school’s educational value. These are the students that will continue to prosper throughout their lives because they realize the extreme importance of education. There is a secret, yet not so secret, motivation behind their determination to exceed standards and expectations in school. The secret they withhold is their overwhelming desire to be successful in the future.