SCLY2 - Topic 3 - Ethnicity and Education (AQA AS Sociology)

In 2007 according to the DfES, the percentage of Chinese girls gaining 5 GCSE's at grade A*-C was _____ compared to only ___ of Black girls.

In 2007 according to DfES, the percentage of Chinese boys achieving 5 GCSE's grade A*-C was ____ compared to only ___ of Black boys.

According to ______________, white pupils make less progress between 11 and 16 than Black or Asian pupils, and it is possible that White pupils may soon become the worst performing ethnic group in the country, because minority groups are improving more rapidly.

Which ethnic group are the lowest achievers?

Cultural deprivation theorists see the lack of intellectual and linguistic skills as a major cause of underachievement for many minority children. They argue that many children from low-income Black families lack intellectual stimulation and enriching experiences. This leaves them poorly equipped for school because they have not been able to develop reasoning and problem-solving skills. Bereiter and Englemann consider the language spoken by low-income black American families as inadequate for educational success. They see it as for educational success. They see it as ungrammatical, disjointed and incapable of expressing abstract ideas. Likewise ____________ identifies their lack of standard english as a major barrier to progress in education and integration into wider society.

There has been concern that children who do not speak English at home may be held back educationally. However, _______________ found that language was not a major factor in underachievement, while Gillborn and Mirza (2005) note that Indian pupils do very well despite often not having English as their home language.

Cultural deprivation theorists argue that the failure to socialise children adequately is the result of a dysfunctional family structure. For example ___________ argues that because many black families are headed by a lone mother, their children are deprived of adequate care because she has to struggle financially in the absence of a male breadwinner. The fathers absence also means that boys lack an adequate role model of male achievement. He sees cultural deprivation as a cycle where inadequately socialised children from unstable families go on to fail at school and become inadequate parents themselves.

The New Right put forward an explanation for cultural deprivation. For example, _______________ argues that a high rate of lone parenthood and a lack of positive male role models lead to underachievement of some minorities. Similarly Flew (1984) believes that ethnic differences in achievement stem from cultural differences outside the education system, not discrimination within it.

_______________ sees the low achievement levels of some ethnic minorities as resulting from a failure to embrace mainstream British culture.

_____________ also sees family structure as contributing to the underachievement of Black Caribbean pupils in Britain. From a comparison of Black and Asian pupils he claims that Asians are high achievers because their culture is more resistant to racism and gives them a greater sense of self worth. By contrast, he argues, Black Caribbean culture is less cohesive and less resistant to racism. As a result, many black pupils have low self-esteem and under-achieve. He argues that the difference is the result of the differing impact of colonialism on the two groups. He argues that the experience of slavery was culturally devastating for Blacks. Being transported and sold into slavery meant that they lost their language, religion and entire family system. By contrast, Asian family structures, languages and religions were not destroyed by colonial rule.

_____________ argue that Asian family structures bring educational benefits. Asian parents have more positive attitudes towards education, and higher aspirations for their children's future, and as a result are more supportive.

___________ argues that adult authority in Asian families is similar to the model that operates in schools. She found that respectful behaviour towards adults was expected from children. This had a knock on effect in school, since parents were more likely to be supportive of school behaviour policies.

Some sociologists see the Asian family as an obstacle to success, despite the high levels of achievement of some Asian minorities. For example, ________ describes Asian families as 'Stress-Ridden', bound by tradition and with a controlling attitudes towards children especially girls.

A survey of state schools for the Sutton trust (2004) found that 80% of 11-16 year old ethnic minority pupils aspired to go to university, as against only ____% of White pupils.

_________ argues that street culture in white working class areas can be brutal and so young people have to learn how to withstand intimidation and intimidate others. In this context, school can become a place where the power games that young people engage in on the street are played out again, bringing disruption and making it hard for pupils to succeed.

_______________ criticises cultural deprivation theory for ignoring the positive effects of ethnicity on achievement. He shows that the black Caribbean family, far from being dysfunctional, provides girls with positive role models of strong independent women. Driver argues that this is why black girls tend to be more successful than black boys.

___________ challenges Pryce's view that black pupils fail because their culture is weak and they lack self-esteem . He argues that black pupils underachieve not because of low self-esteem, but because of racism.

_________ sees cultural deprivation as a victim blaming myth. She argues that ethnic minority children are culturally different, not culturally deprived. They underachieve because schools are ethnocentric.

Critics oppose compensatory education because they see it as an attempt to impose the dominant white culture on children who already have a coherent culture of their own. They propose two main alternatives; Multicultural education - a policy that recognises and values minority cultures and includes them in the curriculum. Also anti-racist education - A policy that challenges the prejudice and discrimination that exists in schools and wider society.

According to ___________; Pakistani and Bangladeshi are over 3x more likely than whites to be in the poorest fifth of the population. Unemployment is 3x higher for African and Bangladeshi/Pakistani people than for whites. 15% of ethnic minority households live in overcrowded conditions, compared with only 2% of White households. Pakistani's are nearly twice as likely to be in unskilled or semi-skilled jobs compared to whites. Ethnic minority workers are more likely to be engaged in low-paid home-working , sometimes for as little as £1.50 per hour.

__________ estimates that social class accounts for at least 50% of the difference in achievement between ethnic groups. If we fail to take the different class positions of ethnic groups into account when we compare their educational achievements, there is a danger that we may overestimate the effect of cultural deprivation and under estimate the effect of poverty and material deprivation.

Gillborn and Mirza argue that social class factors do not override the influence of ethnicity. when we compare pupils of the same social class but different ethnic origins, we still find differences in achievement. This is particularly the case for black children, since even middle class black pupils do comparatively poorly at GCSE.

While material deprivation and poverty has an impact on the educational achievement of some ethnic minority children, some sociologists argue that poverty is itself the product of another factor, namely racism.As _________ puts it 'discrimination is a continuing and persistent feature of the experience of Britain's citizens of minority ethnic origin.

______ shows how racial discrimination leads to social exclusion and how this worsens the poverty faced by ethnic minorities. In housing, for instance, discrimination means that minorities are more likely to be forced into substandard accommodation than white people of the same class.

According to ____________, in one local education authority African caribbean children were the highest achievers on entry to primary school, yet by the time it came to GCSE, they had the worst results of any ethnic group.

A good illustration of the impact of labelling on black pupils comes from studies by ___________ and Gillborn and Youdell (2000). ________ found that teachers were quicker to discipline black pupils than others for the same behaviour. Gillborn and Youdell argue that this is the result of teachers racialized expectations. They found that teachers expected black pupils to present more discipline problems and misinterpreted their behaviour as threatening or as a challenge to authority. When teachers acted on this misperception, the pupils responded negatively and further conflict resulted. In turn, black pupils felt teachers underestimated their ability and picked on them. Gillborn and Youdell conclude that much of the conflict between white teachers and black pupils stems from the racial stereotypes teachers hold, rather than the pupil's actual behaviour.

_______________ found, schools tend to see black boys as a threat and to label them negatively, leading eventually to exclusion.

____________ found that teachers stereotypes of black pupils as badly behaved could result in them being placed in lower sets than other pupils of similar ability. Both exclusions and allocation to lower sets are likely to lead to lower levels of achievement.

_____________'s study of a multi-ethnic primary school shows that Asian pupils can also be the victims of teachers labelling. She found that despite the school's apparent commitment to equal opportunities, teachers held ethnocentric views; that is, they took for granted that British culture and standard English were superior. This affected how they related to Asian pupils. For example, teachers assumed they would have a poor grasp of English and left them out of class discussions or used simplistic, childish language when speaking to them. Asian pupils also felt isolated when teachers expressed disapproval of their customs or mispronounced their names. In general, teachers saw them not as a threat but as a problem that they could ignore. The effect was that Asian pupils, especially the girls, were marginalised - pushed to the edges and prevented from particularly fully.

An example of pupils responding to negative labels by rejecting them is __________'s study of a group of black girls in year 11 of a london comprehensive school. The girls were untypical because they were high achievers in a school where most black girls were placed in low streams. Instead of accepting their labels and turning them into a self fulfilling prophecy. They channelled their anger into educational success.

___________ studied ambitious black girls who faced teacher racism. However, the girls in her study failed to achieve their ambitions because their coping strategies restricted their opportunities and resulted in underachievement. She found that racist teachers discouraged black pupils from being ambitious through the kind of advice they gave them about careers and option choices. For example teachers discouraged them from aspiring to professional careers. A large majority of the teachers in the study held racist attitudes, she identifies 3; The colour-blind, the liberal chauvinists and the overt racists.

__________ examines the responses and strategies black pupils adopt to cope with racism. In his study of a boys secondary school, he found that many teachers had a stereotype of black machismo, which sees all black boys as rebellious, anti-authority and anti-school. One effect of this stereotyping is that black boys are more likely to be excluded from school.

Sewell identifies four ways in which the boys responded to racist stereotyping; The rebels, the conformists, the retreatists and the innovators.

____________ describe the curriculum in British schools as ethnocentric because it gives priority to white culture and the English language. Similarly David (1993) describes the curriculum as specifically British curriculum that teaches the culture of the host community, while largely ignoring non-European languages, literature and music.

_________ criticises the national curriculum for ignoring cultural and ethnic diversity and for promoting an attitude of 'little Englandism'. For example, the history curriculum tries to recreate 'A mythical age of empire and past glories', while ignoring the histories of black and Asian people. Board (1971; 2005) explains how the ethnocentric curriculum may underachievement. For example, in history the British are presented as bringing civilisation to the primitive peoples they colonised. This image of black people as inferior undermines black childrens self-esteem and leads to their failure.

It is unclear what impact the ethnocentric curriculum has. For example, while it may ignore asian culture, indian and chinese pupils achievement is above the national average. _______ argues that black children do not in fact suffer from low self-esteem.

Troyna and Williams argue that explanations of ethnic differences in achievement need to go beyond simply examining individual teacher racism to look at how schools and colleges routinely discriminate against ethnic minorities. They therefore distinguish between; Individual racism that results from prejudiced views of individuals, and Institutional racism - discrimination that is built into the way institutions such as schools and colleges operate. From this point of view the ethnocentric curriculum is a prime example of racial bias being built into the everyday workings of schools and colleges.

_____________ argues that marketisation has given schools greater scope to select pupils and this puts some ethnic minorities at a disadvantage. This is because selection gives more scope for negative stereotypes to influence decisions about schools admissions.

____________ argues that to understand the relationship between ethnicity and achievement, we need to look at how ethnicity interacts with gender and class. She claims that in examining black childrens achievement, sociologists tend to look at their culture and ethnicity but rarely at their class.