Education's role in social inequality and opportunity

Education

Description of education

Education is the learning and experience that impacts every individual in one way or the other. In fact, better education paves the way for better economic opportunities and this is one of the key areas that results in economic disparities in the society.

Education as a field of sociology is about understanding how different aspects such as public institutions, parental role, society and environment affect the learning abilities of individuals. It concentrates heavily on the role of schools and universities in the modern society (Ballantine & Hammack, 2011).

Education in the field of sociology

In sociology, education is viewed as a means towards better social equality and to overcome many social evils such as poverty. In that context, education is the path for acquiring social status and money. It is also seen as an area where the individual differences in terms of learning abilities is evident. The sociological aspect of education looks into the role played by parents, peers and the society at large on an individual and it analyzes the number of opportunities they get to reach their true learning potential. To better understand these sociological aspects of education, there are two main theories and they are the functionalist theory and the conflict theory.

Functionalist theory

Functionalist theory, also known as structural functionalism, believes that the society is in a natural equilibrium and every member of the society accepts the social norms that are established in it. It is based on Darwin's theory of evolution that is based on individual differences as well as the need to adapt to existing rules to survive.

The crux of this theory is to educate children to the existing and established rules of the society so that they grow up to be part of it and it places this responsibility on the public education system to achieve this objective. Also, this theory encourages the society to identify talent and prepare them for the higher end jobs while the ones with lesser talents end up with the least paying jobs. This is a process of the continuity and through this process, the social order and the norms are maintained (Bessant & Watts, 2002).

Conflict theory

The conflict theory opposes the functionalist theory because it promotes inequality in society by giving opportunity to the talented ones to dominate those that remain at the bottom. The education system is believed to promote this social inequality and provide different classes of workers who are at different economic levels, thereby allowing the society to adhere to its fundamental ideology of inequality (Andersen & Taylor, 2007).

Value and implications of sociological research

There are only a few institutions that are protected against sociological inquiry and one such institution is education. This has been the blind norm followed through all these years because it was implied that schools identify the right objectives and take the necessary steps to impart learning to students that conform with these objectives (Wells, 1999). However, the changing demographics coupled with the vast amount of changes that are taking place in our society make it relevant to have sociological inquiry into the education system as well.

The U.S. is seeing a boom in immigrant population and it is estimated that by 1950, white population will be the new minority. Along with this comes a more multi-cultural society and maybe even a multi-lingual one. So, the new generation of kids should be taught to adapt to these changing measures and it is the public school system that will play a big role in handling this transition. Another change is the technology and the resultant lifestyle that changes with it. With social media, video gaming and mobile use on the rise, kids are increasingly spending lesser time in the real world and this is another challenge that the school system has to handle. Due to these anticipated changes, its important that the education comes under sociological inquiry so that it can better perform its role in shaping the younger generation to be economically and socially better.