Outline and assess New Labours strategies and theories on educational policies

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Nishtar Hussain

 Outline and assess New Labour’s strategies and theories on educational policies

        

New Labour strategies and theories on educational policies have contributed significantly on influencing a better change on education since the 1988 Education Act. There were four major changes which had been made to the education system; the changes were introduced in order to manage the diverse problems with had recently emerged. Machin and Vignoles (2006) outlined these four categories as; secondary education standards falling, limited participation in post-16 (sixth form), students having a poor grasp of basic skills and unequal participation in higher education. The classified problems were not only problems identified by New Labour; New Right too had similar concerns about the education system.  However New Right have previously been criticised as they were more concerned regarding the problems surrounding the participation in Post 16 and the poor grasp of basic skills rather than all four of them as a whole. Hence, I will outline and evaluate New Labour’s approach concerning the educational policies.

The first problem identified was the standards of secondary education declining, because of this New Labour believed that in order to raise the standards they would have to provide greater parental choices. Giving this privilege would enable more competition which was their clear aim as competition would influence a rise in the standards of schools as there would be a gap in the market for more choice and diversity. A model example of how effective parental choice would be take academies, faith schools and specialist schools they are given more freedom to choose, this creates a friendly rivalry amongst parents and children to achieve the possible best. Some critics view that giving parents the right to more choice would result in further inequality rather than equality, take middle-class parents for instance they use their material and cultural wealth to ‘buy’ their children’s education and gain places in much better schools. Sociologist Ball (2008) also criticises this view he states how giving parents the ability to choose produces social segregation which further influences inequality.  Another way in which New Labour had believed they would be able to raise the standards of secondary education would be to improve the teaching standards due to the pressure of market forces in state schools this would therefore increase the participation in further education which would influence an equal participation in higher education.  However a criticism would be that the rise in exam success may not necessarily be due to the impact of marketisation it could be because of the other factors.

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The second problem which was identified by New Labour was the limited participation in post-16, they considered two significant ways in which they would be able to increase this participation. The first idea was to develop vocational courses, for example; GNVQ’s, modern apprenticeships and diplomas. Sociologist Ball (2008) identified that 40% of students will take vocational courses. By introducing more vocational courses, they would be able to improve the perceived skills deficiencies of British Workers and give themselves more of an ability to gain work. However a rising concern is regarding the division between vocational and non-vocational students, New Labour recognise ...

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