Assess and discuss interactionist explanations of social class inequalities within
schools.
40 marks
Interactionism is a micro theory, which means that they mainly focus on individuals way of
interactions and carry out qualitative methods in order to achieve results, unlike macro theories
such as Marxists, where they focus on the whole in societies and use quantitative methods.
Interactionists argue that the key to social inequalities is through the teachers and informs us
that inequalities are due to the attitudes and stereotypes of teachers towards the working class
students, therefore has a significant impact on students educational achievements, for example
they state that middle class students are seven times more likely to attend top universities
compared to the working class students. Similarly, Marxists acknowledge the fact that there are
social inequalities in education but put much more emphasis on the fact that it is due the
exploitation of working class, as they are less likely to achieve better educational achievements
as the parents lack the knowledge and finance to provide and support their families efficiently.
Whereas, Functionalists argue that social inequalities is due to the attitudes of the parents and
students themselves, as they do not have the “pro-education” mindset, hence most of the
working class students fail to achieve higher than middle class students, thus why put the blame
on teachers, who simply teach without any discrimination.
According to Interactionists, teachers have a significant role in a student's life as most of the
students obey what the teachers offer, hence many teachers are believed to have a certain
stereotypes of each individual, especially based on their social class, therefore teachers attach
the stereotypical views on students and behave in accordance to the stereotypes. Becker
supports this idea and explains that teachers have a common mental image of an ‘ideal
student’, which is highly based on the student’s social class instead of their actual academic
ability. In accordance to the statistics, there is a 27% gap between the middle and working class
students in GCSEs, where the middle class students achieve significantly higher than the
working class, hence many teachers attain the belief that middle class students are much more
capable of achieving higher, thus are the ‘ideal students’ unlike the working class.
Consequently, due the fact that many teachers place these stereotypical views on certain
students based on their social class, Rosenthal and Jacobson argue through their study, that
labelling leads to self fulfilling prophecy, where many of these students, who are either positively
labelled or negatively labelled, start to accept and attain these labels. To illustrate, working class
students are predominantly labelled negatively by teachers, and due to these labels, many fail
to improve academically as they start to live up to these negative academic labels set by their
teachers. Therefore, teachers who positively and negatively label students in relation to their
social class, they start to live up to the expectations and will either thrive or fail. However, many
sociologists would argue that labelling is too deterministic, therefore does not have a significant
impact on individuals, arguably, Fuller assert the concept of self negating prophecy, where the
students reject the stereotypical views set by their teachers and will start to challenge the ideas
instead of attaining them, therefore it does not have a significant impact on the students,
especially the working class students as they have attained their own views on their academic
ability. Although, to an extent that many students from low achieving backgrounds self negate
, the beliefs and ideas set by their teachers, the argument of the significance of labelling and its
consequence being self fulfilling prophecy is much stronger when identifying the cause of social
inequalities in education. This therefore suggests that due to the stereotypical ideas set by the
teachers, enables a crucial impact on individuals where many either succeed or fail
academically due to the constant reminder of their failures, as a whole social class.
Another reason that the interactionists put forth for the cause of social inequalities within
education is the concept of settings and streamings. This means that students are placed in
settings and streamings, based on their stereotypical academic ability in that particular subject
or in a set for all the subjects, therefore can be a disadvantage for the working class pupils. Ball
argues that students from the working class are placed in lower sets based on the perception of
the teachers, as most of the teachers view working class individuals as low achieving hence
positioned lower compared to middle class individuals. This is statistically proven, as 80% of
middle class pupils achieve 5+ A*-Cs compared to 35% of working class, this further
emphasises the fact that the working class individuals are placed lower hence cannot achieve
higher due to the limitations of lower sets. Therefore, as many working class students who are
labelled stereotypically tend to be in lower sets, as they are believed to achieve far less than the
middle class students, to which, undoubtedly leads to self fulfilling prophecy, hence achieve
significantly lower when compared to the middle class, as Lacey argues that teachers attach
positive labels to middle class students, thus in higher sets allowing them achieve and perform
much more efficiently and effectively as they are seen more capable. However, teachers would
argue that sets are based on academic achievements rather than stereotypical views,
additionally they would argue that sets allows easy and quick understanding of the needs of
individual sets and students, for example the lower sets enables teachers to improve individual
flaws in a particular subject, on the other hand are able to challenge and maintain the capability
and efficiency of higher set individuals. Whilst the teachers argue that working class capability of
students is determined by previous academic achievements and are put in sets in accordance
to their actual ability, to some extent is important feature in explaining social class inequalities in
education, however, the gap between the achievements between the working class and middle
class is most significant, as Halsey argues that the middle class outperform the working class
remarkably and hence it is wastage of ability, in not allowing equal opportunity in education to
allow working class to prosper and reduce the gap. Therefore, settings and streamings further
define the difference between the working class and middle class, as the working class
dominate the lower sets, hence it strengthens stereotypical views amongst teachers, later
enabling them to attach these views on the whole of working class individuals, which,
eventually, will allow the student to self fulfill these beliefs therefore unable to thrive and achieve
higher.
Furthermore, Hargreaves argue that as a consequence of determining sets according to
teachers labels on an individual, it leads to the formation of subcultures. This means that
individuals forming groups with other individuals, they hold similar norms and values which are
different to the rest of society’s norms and values. Hargreaves argues that this is formed
because teachers place individuals in the lower sets based on the teachers stereotypical views
