Do schools serve the interests of both society and individuals?

Through this, schools instil the value of achievement and the value of equality of opportunity. Parsons says that in America these are the main values.

The value of achievement is taught through rewards for doing well in exams and schoolwork and encourages children to strive to do their best. Parsons argues that as we live in a stratified society, it is important to instil this value to ensure that the most able people are motivated to fill the most important positions. Therefore, through education, role allocation can occur with people selected in terms of talent and qualification and placed in the job hierarchy to a level most suited to their abilities.

Equally importantly schools teach the value of equality of opportunity. Pupils in schools are treated with universalistic values in a meritocratic system; therefore all are treated equally and do well or badly through their own effort and ability. Teaching this idea of different rewards for different achievements in schools can then be carried on to the workplace. Parsons sees this as an important value as it helps to prevent conflict between those in high status jobs and those in low status occupations as people have the belief that they all had an equal opportunity to do well and therefore that inequalities in society are legitimate. Those who have done well have deserved to do so and thus are not a figure for resentment.

Functionalists Davis and Moore support this view, that a major function of the education system is to provide a fair and equal method of role allocation and that there is equality of educational opportunity and that all have an equal chance and therefore inequalities in society are fair and just.

Further support can be seen in from Tom Howarth in Item A, which agrees with the viewpoint that even selection is required within schools with 'support for the hard-working, the inventive and the original'.

Parsons therefore, argues that the education system benefits society through effective role selection and allocating people to jobs most suitable to them. It is also beneficial as it is a meritocratic system which provides a just reason for inequality in terms of job status and rewards. It also serves the needs of the individual by giving them the equality of educational opportunity and allows all to achieve through ability and talent with no discrimination based on their gender or class background.

The functionalist perspective on the education system is that it is a fair and meritocratic way of educating children with societies values and norms. It provides them with specific skills needed to help them become valuable and consensual members of society. It therefore serves both the needs of society by maintaining consensus and harmony and also the interests of the individual who receives a fair education with as equal an opportunity to do well as their peers.

Marxists, however, criticise the functionalist viewpoint and would argue that this stance ignores the inequality in society. It disagrees with the idea that education acts as a neutral sifting process where ability is the only factor regarding achievement. They would argue that social class is very much an influencing factor in success and that no equality of opportunity exists within education.

Bowles and Gintis argue that the main function of the education system is to ensure adequate labour power for the capitalist class. Also they believe that education is subservient to the needs of the dominant class and due to this there is a great level of correspondence between what occurs in schools through the hidden curriculum and what happens in the workplace. This is referred to as Bowles and Gintis' 'Correspondence theory'.

There are four main correspondences that are highlighted, firstly, that schools produce subservience and the education system is set so that those who conform do well whereas those who do not, do badly. They argue that it is necessary to instil this subservience in order to create a docile workforce, which ensures false consciousness and avoids revolution.

Secondly they argue that the education system produces the acceptance of hierarchy, there is a clear hierarchy in schools, i.e. teachers over pupils, and this is then carried through to the workplace, again preventing conflict.

Bowles and Gintis also state that education produces motivation by external rewards. Pupils are encouraged to be motivated by rewards such as qualifications, and as such access to higher paid employment, rather than the actual enjoyment of learning itself. This represents itself in the workplace with motivation being for the external reward of the level of pay rather than for job satisfaction.

The final correspondence they highlight is the fragmentation of knowledge. In school pupils experience only parts of the education system and our taught unconnected academic subjects. This occurs in the workplace where all tasks are fragmented into small roles and thus the worker does not see all aspects involved in a business and without full knowledge of how the system works there is no incentive or ability for revolution.

Therefore, Bowles and Gintis' reject the functionalist view that we live in a meritocratic society and that therefore education is also non-meritocratic and thus equality of opportunity is not possible within a capitalist society. They argue that rather than merit and ability influencing their attainment it is a persons class background that is considered most important to capitalism. They argue that meritocracy in society is a myth, which merely reduces the discontent of those who are least successful, and that the education system is just something that serves the needs of capitalism by legitimating inequality and thus preventing conflict.

However there are many criticisms of Bowles and Gintis' findings. They did not actually do any research in schools and make assumptions about the influence of the hidden curriculum. This criticism is highlighted by other studies, such as Willis in 1977 that showed that some pupils do not have respect for school rules or for the teachers. He himself criticises their view as being overly deterministic.

Also Hickox concludes that capitalism seemed to progress adequately before state education was introduced. It could, additionally be said that under this theory the values passed through capitalist controlled education are given to all pupils which must include the children of capitalists themselves. However the Marxist counter claim to this would be that these children actually receive a different education due to their class background.

Overall Bowles and Gintis study tends to be criticised by most as being too deterministic as it suggests that the pupils are unable to think for themselves.

In view of the criticisms levelled at Bowles and Gintis' work some other sociologists have attempted to construct a more sophisticated Marxist analysis of the link between capitalism and the education system.

Henry Giroux firstly argued that the behaviour of working class students is not completely controlled by capitalism. This view was carried on and explored more deeply by Neo-Marxist Paul Willis who also brings in the interactionist perspective.

He studied a group of 12 schoolboys, known as 'the lads', and recognizes through this study that schools do not always churn out obedient and ideal workers. It showed that the 12 'lads' developed an anti school subculture and were more interested in 'having a laff'. They rejected the values of the school, such as obedience and respect for authority, which is demonstrated in Item B, an extract from Willis research, that gives an example of 'the lads' lying and misleading teachers. They also rejected the jobs that achievement in education brings about. Willis argues that the labelling of these 'lads' as stupid and being put into lower streams means that to develop their self esteem they needed to reverse the values of the school and as such rejected education. They therefore did not want to do well and actually wanted low status, manual jobs

This then would suggest that 'the lads' resisted capitalism and were not turned into a docile, ideal workforce. However, whilst 'the lads' seem to being resisting capitalism they actually reproduce it by in fact wanting the low status jobs that capitalism deems they should have.

Like the traditional Marxist view, Willis also disputes the functionalist view that education system is beneficial to society and the individual. Rather that it benefits capitalist society, as even when there is resistance this is still beneficial for capitalism.

Willis theory on education is similar to Bowles and Gintis in that there are correspondences between the workplace and education but it is not as deterministic and shows that it is possible for the individual to resist capitalism.

The main criticisms of Willis findings are that it involved only a small sample, all of who were male, and therefore cannot be used to generalise for the whole population. Also as the study involved participant observation the subjects were therefore aware of the study and as such may have acted differently under this situation.

Overall the education system does appear to benefit society, be it a meritocratic society from the functionalist view, or a capitalist society from the Marxist perspective. It provides society with an educated workforce and, whether they are right or wrong, teaches the norms and values of society.

However whilst functionalists argue that the individuals interests are served well by the education system it seems that their idea of education does not truly exist and that equality of educational opportunity is not prevalent and thus the interests of individuals could be better served in a system that is free from discrimination on the basis of gender, class or ethnicity.

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