A brief assessment of my view on education
Over time I have come to believe that education is a system set up by capitalists to benefit capitalists. In the same way the family prepares children to be proletariat who will work for the bourgeoisie in some way through primary socialisation, education does so through secondary socialisation. It teaches children specialised skills when they take certain subjects, readying them for the job they will take later in life. This benefits capitalists as the workers will be good at the job they take as they have been trained in the necessary areas.
Education creates a strong workforce, as as well as teaching skills, it teaches authority and knowledge. In creating this strong workforce, capitalists have ensured that they will make more money as production will be fast and produce will be up to standards very quickly. The bourgeoisie control what is set out in the national curriculum and therefore have a strong influence on lessons, meaning everyone in each generation that attends standard schooling will learn the same knowledge, norms and values.
Education mirrors work. At school, children become familiar with a hierarchy on which they are at the bottom, with people in positions of authority above them according to rank, i.e teachers then vice principles, principles followed by a board of governors, similar to the working hierarchy - manual workers, white collar workers, professionals, managers and executives. Education makes children familiar with this hierarchy on purpose, as it means they settle in to their role on the bottom of the ladder with people in positions of power and authority above them, and will therefore settle into being workers without disruption and know to obey those above them for fear of repercussions. Education assimilates with work - everything you learn in the institution is needed for the working world and so both work together. The hierarchy in education is disguised and so people do not notice it and therefore do not notice that the capitalists are indoctrinating them to the idea that they should be exploited by those above them, this is yet another way capitalists ensure that they stay in power over the proletariat.
Education exists merely to deduce who will be bourgeois and who a proletariat, rather than creating either through knowledge and intelligence. Education dictates roles. It is mainly about transmitting capitalists values and therefore meritocracy does not exist, since capitalists believe the prolat. should stay in their roles and the bourgeois in theirs. If people cannot break free from their roles as either of these, then there is no equality and again no existing meritocratic system. Althusser believed in the idea of state apparatus which means social control. He said that there were two types of social control: idealogical and repressive. Ideological control is control through ideas and beliefs whereas repressive control is a physical control. It can therefore be viewed that capitalists use idealogical control in education in ways such as the hidden curriculum. Through this hidden curriculum of capitalist norms and values and through being taught capitalist appointed subjects, children are indoctrinated into a capitalist worlds. Education simply builds on the capitalist norms and values that the family introduces through primary socialisation.
Repressive control is used in education through punishments such as detention, however children are more likely to rebel against this type of social control. Education therefore makes people feel that capitalist norms and values are fair through indoctrination. Most people, however, are unaware that this ideological control through the hidden curriculum is taking place - this shows just how subtle and effective it is.
Education is a capitalist system created to benefit capitalists and as they control it so subtly, they succeed as people are unaware they are even using it to ideologically control people.
(Meritocracy - achieved status)