Independent, Catholic or Government schools

Notes on “Choice between Government, Catholic and Independent schools: Culture and community rather than class” by Jonathan Kelley and M.D.R. Evans

The Australian Social Monitor, Vol. 7(2), 2004

Factors affects attendance at independent or catholic or government schools???

• Father’s occupation
• Income
• Parent’s education
• Trade union membership
• Religious affiliation
• Political affiliation
• Gender
• Family structure
• Population where family lives

Farm families more likely to send their children to independent schools as schooling was only available to Year 8 in country areas during the 1950’s so they turned to independent boarding schools p.52

“Parents education is the only class related variable in our model that has a significant effect on the probability of sending one’s children to Catholic school, but even it is not large. P. 37

Class differences are larger when analyzing independent schools but these are a matter of parental education and occupation rather than parental income. P. 38

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Is this different now? Interesting to look at more studies in this area to see if they achieve the same/similar results as this...that income does not hugely influence a parent's decision to send their children to catholic or more significantly, an independent school. Parental education is more of an influencing factor - is this still the case?

Readings for Cultural Politics in Education Assignment 1

As I said in my previous post I have to interview 3 people about their educational background. Nobody has gotten back to me yet but I hope that my volunteers will get back to me soonish. One is easy to persuade as I live with him!
My aim today on this Friday of the long weekend is to read and summarise some important points in the articles for use in the assignment as I did for the previous on.
I want to focus on Class and the Hidden Curriculum.

Article 1 - The Hidden Curriculum: An overview. A sociology of educating (4th ed., pp.65-76. Continuum.

Interesting points from the article:

Hidden Curriculum: Reid (1986)

“a concept that refers to all of those socialising practices that are not included in the official curriculum but that contribute toward the reproduction of our culture.

Hidden Curriculum (Adapted from Postman & Wiengartner, 1971)

• Passive acceptance vs active criticism
• Knowledge creation is beyond the power of students (not their concern)
• Recall is the most important skill – recall of unrelated facts
• Authority is valued – independent judgement is not
• Individual and peer ideas are not important
• Emotions are unimportant
• Single, unambiguous correct answers
• Each subject is separate from the other
• Hierachy of subjects – minor and major subjects p.65

Drama teachers always complaining that this is the case in school - what other subjects are affected?
Look at the HSC syllabus - core subjects - Maths, English, Science

Hidden curriculum: Further (Meighan & Siraj-Blatchford, 2003)

• Competition rather than cooperation
• Helping yourself better than helping others
• Reading, writing and maths more important than talking, thinking and creating
• Adults more important than children
• Men more important than women
• Whites more important than other ethnic groups
• Western world more advanced than other parts of the world p.66

Hidden Curriculum can mean: (Portelli, 1993)

• Unofficial expectations of implicit but expected messages
• Unintended learning outcomes of messages
• Implicit messages arising from the structure of schooling
• Created by the students p.66

Change in education often opposed by those who have been through the system

(reproduction of values?)

• E.g. not accepting play as an acceptable form of learning (e.g. Scandanavian countries use this extensively)
• Mass schooling begun in an ‘information impoverished society” – this has changed now so should schools look and act differently? P.68

See Edpod - Interview with David Salter at http://www.abc.net.au/rn/edpod/stories/2007/2000292.htm about Schools for the 21st century

Language - (de Bono, 1971)

The English language has a marked tendency toward dichotomies good/bad, black/white, strong/weak etc and a consequence is an oversimplification of complex ideas p.71

See shows such as Difference of Opinion as a confirmation of this!

Hidden Curriculum - Jackson (1968)
3 R’s – Rules, Regulations and Routines.
Students must also learn to cope with the delay, denial and interruptions in most classrooms. P. 71.

Instilling in children/adolescents behavior expected of then in the workplace?

Britain – dominant ideology of meritocracy

“Place in the class structure is assumed to be, at least in part, a result of his or her own qualities and endeavours (or lack of them)” Connell (and others)

Is Australia similar in this respect??

Bowles and Gintis (1976) – Correspondence Theory

Attitudes passed on by schools correspond directly to those of the social relations of work in a capitalist economy and therefore constitute a preparation for life in a class-divided society. P. 72

Is this why philosophy departments are shrinking and business studies is the most popular course in the HSC?

New Sociology of Education

Writers such as Bordieu, Passeron (1977), Wexler (1976) Bernstein (1977) - empahsised the relative autonomy of the school to the social structure (as opposed to the ideas of Bowles & Gintis) and focussed attention of the ‘hidden curriculum’ and ‘invisible pedagogies’ which operate to the advantage of the power groups in society.

New Sociology of Education

Writers such as Bordieu, Passeron (1977), Wexler (1976) Bernstein (1977) - empahsised the relative autonomy of the school to the social structure (as opposed to the ideas of Bowles & Gintis) and focussed attention of the ‘hidden curriculum’ and ‘invisible pedagogies’ which operate to the advantage of the power groups in society.

Further notes on this can be found on My Work link.

Assignment 1 Finished!

Wrote the final draft, checked it, checked it again and checked it again..and sent it. 5 days early but I wanted it out there so I could concentrate on my next assignment for Cultural Politics of Education. This involves interviewing 3 people and finding out about their highschool experiences. I just sent this message off to 5 friends who I identified as being possible candidates;

I have this assignment for university - detailed below:

1. Select one of the substantive issues addressed within the course. Appropriate issues are social class, gender, indigeneity, ethnicity or rurality.

2. Interview a minimum of three adults (must be over 18 years of age for ethical reasons) about how this issue impacted upon their own schooling.

In other words, you are asking your interviewees to reflect upon their own schooling and to explain to you how the specific issue of interest influenced the nature of the schooling which they (or their peers) experienced. For example, you could ask them about how the physical lay-out of the class, the curriculum taught, the nature of the teaching employed, or the relationships between teachers and students, the way different groups of students were treated in the playground, or any other practices which occur within schools, were all influenced by students' class or gender or ethnicity etc

I would like to focus on the issue of social class in reference to this.

What I would like to know is if I could have an hour of your time to ask some questions, have a loose discussion about this issue of social class and your own highschool experience. Perhaps you felt that class was very evident and was an issue at your school, maybe not. Maybe because of your class background or perceived class background you felt that you were pushed in certain directions in school or maybe not. Were you aware of inequalities - directed from the teacher to the students or within the student body? Were these explicit or implicit? How was your parent's attitude toward education? Were they aware of social class in determining how you were to be educated - private school, public school, work ethic etc?

These are just some ideas to get your minds going.

I only need three interviews but would like to talk to more people so that when I do work with the literature I have a lot of scope for choosing which best works for the essay at the time. If you would be interested in doing this I will obviously need to set up a time - this can be over coffee (or wine ; ) but I will be bringing my tape recorder ; ) I need for you to sign a document after I have written a summary of the interview to say that it is a true representation of our discussion but apart from talking to me, it would be great if I can perhaps see (if it is possible and it certainly might not be) to see a school report, a teacher comment, maybe a website link for your school, or some other artefact that could be included in the project if you feel comfortable with that. I of course respect your right to say NO WAY to that.

Anyway, let me know and we can set up a time very soon if you would like to participate.

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We'll see what they say. I have already begun collecting material for this and have watched some good documentaries. More on this later as I plan to be reading furiously for background this long weekend thanks to APEC.

Adieu

Update on Readings

Tonight I spent the entire evening reading and reviewing. The task was to have a first read, notetaking and highlighting session, going through a bundle of articles about adolescent identity - based on class and ethnicity. This will tie into my first two assignments. I have included notes on two of the readings tonight and plan to add two more tomorrow night.

Some interesting points from 2 of the readings to follow up:

The Development of Stereotypes about the rich and poor: Age, Race, and Family Income differences in beliefs by Woods, Kurtz-Costes and Rowley, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Vol.34, No.5, October 2005.

• Research about gender has shown that there is a potential role for stereotypes in identity development (e.g. Bornholt et al, 1994 & Tiedemannn, 2000) p.438
  
• Cognitive development view suggest that stereotypes affect 'information processing by determining how information is encoded and interpreted', this can affect beliefs held by individuals about themselves and others (Bigler & Liben, 1992, Hamilton et al, 1994) p.438
• The relationships between 'social class stereotypes and identity development' can be complicated because social class is not as physically obvious (often) as gender or ethnicity. p.438
• Children's sense of self is a product of interactions with others and comparisons of themselves with others (Pajares and Schunk, 2002) So, poor youths, in particular ethnic minority youth and hampered by negative academic stereotypes about the poor. p.443

The Development of Ethnic Identity during adolescece by French, Seidman, LaRue & Lawrence in Developmental Psychology Vol 42, (1), January 2006

• "The identity crisis of adolescence is resolved by reconciling the identities imposed upon oneself by one's family and society with one's need to assert control and seek out an identity that brings one satisfaction, feelings of industry, and competence.'
  
• Social psychologists focus on identity in terms of the feelings of group belonging and the effects of the identification with social groups (Tajfel & Turner, 1979)
• Social psychologists look at the 'negotiation of one's social identity in the broader context of the value society has places on one's group membership". If a person is confronted with negative attitudes or contexts that 'devalue' the social group, an individual will then need to negotiate the meaning of his or her identity

Three Strategies (Tajfel & Turner 1986) if in a devalued group:

• individual mobility - choose toe leave the group and change membership. If it is not easily changeable (e.g. gender, race, ethnicity) the individual can choose to psychologically leave the group by dis identifying with it.
• social creativity - the group as a whole redefines the meaning of their group membership by comparing themselves on a dimension that they are superior OR by changing values assigned to their group from negative to positive
• social competition - group as a whole challenges the current system to change the hierarchy of group membership in the society.

On the basis of Marcia (1980) conceptualisation of Eriksons’ theory of identity development, Phinney (1989) proposed a Model of Ethnic identity development

Unexamined ethnic Identity - Individuals have unexamined positive OR negative views on their ethnic group

Ethnic identity research (or exploration) - Individuals have started to look into what it means to be a member of the group

Achieved Ethnic identity - Individuals have explored their ethnic group membership and are clear about the meaning of this ethnicity to their own lives.

This paper sets out to examine identity not in terms of development stages but rather in terms of continuous growth. This seems to make sense in that there are many factors that would affect the rate of change and the age at which it occurs. This would also take into account any regression in development. There are subtle changes that are not captured by the stages models but they are useful for developing a basic framework. Other factors that need to be considered that I am very interested in would be social class.

Further notes are available through the link at My Work.

Comments on "Class: by Pria Pria Viswalingam

This was first aired in 2002 and I found a copy at my school library on video. It was interesting to watch it now and see how much hasn't changed....

See here for the link about the series Class
4 Part Documentary Series aired on SBS in 2002

I made some notes:

Ep. 1 - The Establishment

Originally the power brokers/holders - upper class/elite in Australia were the squattocracy - those who owned land. They have now almost entirely lost this power and it have been superseded by those in the corporate world. Formerly this elite - where rigid hierarchies existed, were the models - offered a standard for society. The farmers who came to Australia may not have been rich but they were given land and were able to make sizable incomes from agricultural pursuits. Now, the way of the land is that you need to get bigger, get out or diversify (into tourism for example) to exist. The power of old money has shifted to new money. And the funny thing is, is the new money is going back to the country....sea change etc.

Status is now related to success - money can make success easier - Sir Laurence Street (Ep.1)

Hawke - it is counterproductive to try for equality, but rather you should strive for equality of opportunity (Ep.1)

Sol Encel (Sociologist/UNSW) - no tradition of philanthropy in Australia (unlike America) the giving back the the community that is expected of those in the elite.

Episode 2 - Arts & Kulcha

New money apes old money - through symbols, behaviour, possessions (antiques), cultural pursuits (e.g. ballet/opera)

Interesting interview with catering staff who said that people generally fell into the following categories:
Rich/Elite - used to service/expectation of service - treated staff well
Nouveau Riche - rude and dismissive of staff
Working/Middle class - embarrassed by being served

Being in a class is like being a member of a club - a common language is understood between the members - it operates to include and exclude. There is a value in products because there is a secret language regarding them (e.g. Hermes handbags, Ferrari cars etc)

Rowena Danziger (Ascham School) - Behaviour indicates class. Sense of 'false egalitarianism' - in Australia - 'manners don't matter, presentation doesn't matter, dress doesn't matter' - by modeling this or extolling this we are actually being condescending.

Traditional Aboriginal culture - power and authority were clearly defined but not by economic means. No rich and poor - high and low status, but now class is more defined by the dollar. High status leaders distributed/shared with lower status individuals/groups - but now the lines are blurry because individuals can purchase their own goods.
Indigenous people are effectively outside the class system and have suffered because of it - underclass?

David Williamson - "ethics of individualism is the prime culprit' for the state of society - increasing anxiety and decreasing happiness.

Ep. 3 - Corporate

The key to social mobility is through education but the inequality is growing larger.

Private schools in Australia's past had a sense of value - in the sense that some people sent their children to private schools even for just one year so that it could be on their record (p.s My grandparents wanted to send me to a private school for my final two years of school - I refused, after attending state schools all my school life). It was seen as an investment. Now qualifications/grades/exams are more a determinant of success.

Private schools - students inherit their class positions.

Private schools - Traditon / Values / Duty / Facilities
Very strong emphasis from those involved in private schools talking about developing the 'whole person' - personal and social values.

• Increasing importance of cultural activities
• Increasing importance of academic achievement
• Decreasing importance of sport - macho image
• Increasing importance of extra-curricular activities (ps. this can still be divisive in that not all students attending these fee paying schools can afford to attend all the EC activities esp when they involved overseas travel etc)

Development and maintenance of cliques - this can then move straight to the workplace or similar codes can determine such cliques according to background/class/education etc, Old boys clubs, etiquette and manners, codes and symbols.

Dr Janet McCalman
If you fail at school you are not valued. It used to be that if you did fail, at least you had your physical prowess...but this is no longer valued. There is no place for young men in this case.
Marriage - people not getting married - Working Class Young Men & High Achieving Middle Class Women.

It is certainly interesting that Australia prides itself on the 'fair go' and egalitarian ideals, but it seems more an more obvious that we are following the US model where individuals are punished or exalted for their success on the basis of very individualized behaviours. The cult of individualism means that if you are successful, you worked hard to get where you are and deserve it, but if you have not achieved all you should have achieved, you are to blame - this idea comes into play in this documentary but also in Status Anxiety (Alain de Botton). I don't believed in the 'victim mentality' - you have to take responsibility for yourself, but it is ridiculous to believe that some people don't have a better start (middle and end) than others. The aim should be to raise the bar higher not put the bar in the middle and divided society into two halves - the haves and have nots.
There is an embedded class system in Australia and in terms of education, the division is getting wider. When you consider, as a friend of mine said, that in Canada, the overwhelming majority of students attend public school (and they are well funded) and education is considered a high priority, you wonder what we are doing...to be further investigated.