Educational Hegemony : Ideology In The Classroom

There was a time when America’s education system was top-notch according to the culture and society. With time, a myriad of things has changed, but unfortunately what has not evolved is the American education system. The country is still following a system which was not designed for the current global economic climate. Equality, as positive as it sounds is not as sufficient when it comes to education. The system treats students equally yet expect a similar culmination and outcome. Every child has his individuality and distinct abilities; one cannot judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. Conversely, a few of the prominent reasons why the education system is failing are overcrowded schools, the rise of technology, and following the same old school hours.

With the advancement of technology and of modern societies, the present is currently the golden age of discovery; where information, new and old, are transferred all over the world in an instant. The knowledge we hold are discovered every day, processed, studied, and taught to students. With the vast information we hold, the things taught and learned are also increasing. The vast information we have and the students, are the key to a better future. Society today depends and relies on the new generation, but at a great cost. They push the students mind to the limit, making an army of highly educated students that will benefit society. However, not everyone ends the same way, many are lost and many are not given an opportunity to learn as well. There are students who fail and give up because of too much strain on their minds and bodies. The burden of our future is placed on the shoulders of the students, therefore they should be prioritize above all else.

Looking at the actual amount of conformity present in schools, as opposed to the ideal amount, it seems that schools have moved past a healthy level to a point where students don’t often have to genuinely think for themselves. On a basic level, students don’t have to plan or use their judgment to ensure that they arrive to class on time. They become dependent on bells to tell them when they need to be in class and when they are late (Source B). On a more complex level, students rarely have to use their problem solving skills to come to their own conclusions. Learning in the classroom is typically centered around the memorization of facts and methods as opposed to critical thinking. Students are requested to learn the details and regurgitate them on test day, despite the fact that very little of it will be remembered later on. On the rare occasions when students are confronted by a critical thinking question, they often struggle as they have little practice in this area. If schools were to put more emphasis on individuality, where students could think freely and responsibly and contribute their own ideas, students would better themselves and society

In the 1997 article, “Public Goods, Private Goods: The American Struggle over Educational Goals” by David Labaree, Labaree describes three goals that have been at the core of educational conflicts over the years. The first goal mentioned is democratic equality, which is meant to create good citizens and enable educational access to all. The second goal is social efficiency, which creates workers and is viewed by taxpayers and employers as a goal to prepare students for market roles. Lastly is the third goal of social mobility, where individual success for attractive market roles is the main purpose. This primary goal of education has been ever fluctuating. The argument of this essay is that social mobility has now triumphed over democratic equality and social efficiency as the primary goal of education due to parents. This view of social mobility by parents is negative to due its numerous consequences, significantly the growing disparity between the wealthy and the underprivileged, and additionally, the health of children, their behavior, and the degree to which they learn educational material are all affected.

In this article the author explains how the schools are based on a class system and higher-class areas have better recourses and more classes offered. Higher-class societies have better equipment, new technology, modern facilities, better books, and better teachers. Not only are the school’s educational facilities better the extracurricular activities are also better. For example sports facilities, training facilities, band, art, all because these lower class schools cant afford what these lower class schools can. Students in lower end districts are actually ending up worse off then the higher end students. Meaning attrition rate, drop out rate, sat scores and much more.

Ever since a young age, the youth of the United States are taught that they must strive to be the best they can be. This would ultimately result in one possessing a competitive edge, once one enters the selection process of joining one of many higher institutions of education or the job market. In the essays “Project Classroom Makeover,” “Biographies of Hegemony,” and “Rent Seeking and the Making of an Unequal Society,” respectfully by, Cathy Davidson, Karen Ho, and Joseph Stiglitz, the topic of competitive behaviors and practices is widely addressed and heavily criticized. Education is competitive, yet bias. Institutions of higher education value students based irrelevant factors, something which is unacceptable in the modern, digital age. This heavily impacts the selection process of candidates, leading the system to favor unqualified individuals. Prevalent business superpowers, many residing in Wall Street, pick low hanging fruit. In other words, these firms take very minimal effort to choose candidates in positions that are extremely competitive and valuable. They recruit individuals who graduate from top schools and have no other realistic edge for the company, aside from namesake. Woven into these practices, many examples of uncompetitive behavior arise as well from other factors of the system. In this essay, I argue that competitive and uncompetitive behaviors have molded modern America, with massive organizations and authorities playing into these behaviors from all

The American Education System is not meeting the needs of current students. If anything, the system is not building a sturdy foundation for the future working class. Schools have existed for many years and every period they have worked differently. However, every school’s main purpose was to educate students to be efficacious later in life. Modern day schools are corrupting students with added pressure, standardized tests, making less accommodations for special education students, not following laws, and take away individualism from the students’. The students of modern times are the people of our future and the future does not look too bright with the current American Education System.

The education system in the United States has expanded over the years to prepare individuals for the demanding labor market that constitutes our society. It has shifted from the development of mere intellectual scholars to the development of intellectual scholars competitive enough for a work force that now requires a degree for entrance. As this system of education has expanded throughout the country, so has the reproduction of inequality. To explain the manner in which this system has been structured to achieve a gap of inequity among society’s affluent and disadvantaged members, conflict theorist Karl Marx claims that, “School institutions are intentionally designed to integrate individuals into an unjust society” (Brand lecture, January

The Education system currently in use by the United States of America is a modified version of a methodical tool used to implement obedient control at young age and centralized power solidification. A problem with the system is the obsessive culture of

Ever since its inception, human civilization has been run by a pecking order; a small group of elitists on the top of the chain of command dictate the social norms for the remaining individuals on the antithetical end of the spectrum. Individuals with traits outside these norms are ostracized and looked down upon by the hierarchy. Cathy Davidson’s, Project Classroom Makeover, promotes the use of customization in the education system to accommodate every students’ learning habits over the current use of standardization and curriculum based teachings. On the other hand, Karen Ho’s, Biographies of Hegemony, is about how one’s environment is engineered by institutions, which in turn establish hierarchies who set standards for society. However, Son by Andrew Solomon describes how horizontal identities, traits influenced by peer groups that separate individuals from their families, are seen as abnormalities and those with such identities are on the bottom of the said hierarchy. Based on Davidson’s, Solomon’s, and Ho’s works, individualism does into question because society forces individuals to conform to the standardized norm in which they are not allowed to have unique identities.

The neo-Marxist Althusser (1971) disagrees that the main function of the education is the transmission of common values. He thinks that education is an ideological state apparatus and its main function is to maintain, Legitimate and reproduce, generation by generation, class inequalities in wealth and power by transmitting capitalist values disguised as common values.

Have you ever wondered how humans grow intelligently? The complexity of this question continues to spark conscious awareness of how the human brain grows. Our understanding of wisdom forms through our perception of reality. What makes things real and relevant? A worldview constructs meaning and significance to life experiences that projects decision making skills based off the world. This concept taps into the purpose of teaching and learning by implementing personal philosophies, religious beliefs, and instructional practices that help human mentally mature. This paper addresses the fundamentally concept of a biblical worldview from historically and philosophical perspectives, explains the biblical principles usage in educational practices, and provides key ideas of Christian thinking as it pertains to education.

Bowles and Gintis also believe that schools are no longer about the teaching of a subject but the Social Principle or control of the pupils meaning that schools concentrate more on the hidden curriculum than the knowledge process. Equally, schools don’t reward independence and innovation, therefore meritocracy cannot exist within our capitalist society as capitalism is based on the principle of a ruling class (the bourgeosis) and a working class (the proletariat) and meritocracy would abolish the idea of the ruling class, society would be equal. According to Louis Althusser (1972), a French Marxist philosopher, the school serves to mould individuals into subjects that fit with the requirements of capitalism, they learn submission, deference and respect for the economy and their place in it. The school also works to ensure that the labour force is technically competent. Also, according to Althusser, the ruling class within any society exercises control over and through schooling and the Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs). The ideologies themselves express the material interests of the ruling class, so this control over and through the ISAs maintains what is called class hegemony, or domination. Althusser is also draws attention to the powerful effects of the ‘hidden curriculum’ of

Social, cultural and political changes have immense influences on the education sector. This has been witnessed from the onset African and Asian immigration into the United States from 1954 till present times. During the last quarter of the 20th century, immigrants to the US were denied education and those who received education did so under great threats. The dominant view of society about immigrants during this period was extremely negative and rejecting; thereby not deserving of an education. Currently, the education has been made affordable to everybody due to changing atmosphere of unprecedented social change. In education, this change resulted in the legal dismantling of segregated education for African American children (Collins, 2008). As African American children integrated the schools in the United States, they came to school with the stigma of slavery and the negative attitudes held by the agents of the educational institution. Attitudes and held perceptions were the catalyst for constructions such as biased assessment and the retardation paradigm. From these constructions emerged practices in special education that held large numbers of African American students captive in not only the educational milieu, but also limited their work potential. For this reason, the sociopolitical landscape as a context for curriculum, instruction, and assessment has continued to play a significant role in the education

Educational philosophies influence curriculum from the establishment of the American school systems. The five major philosophies that have influence American education are: 1) Idealism, 2) Essentialism, 3) Perennialism, 4) Progressivism, and 5) Experimentalism. Idealism, Essentialism, and Perennialism are all teacher-based philosophies putting the teacher at the core of the educational experience, with students being passive members of the classroom. In contrast, Progressivism and Experimentalism are student-centered philosophies that focus on the child and their contribution and participation in the formation of classroom experiences, using teachers as guides to help students in their educational development. Although the philosophies differ, many of them define curriculum as a encompassing unit of goals, methods, materials and assessment.