Marketisation Flashcards
What is marketisation?
Marketisation is the process of introducing market forces (consumer choice & competition) into areas of the state.
What is the 1988 The Education Reform Act?
Influenced by the neoliberal ideas of the New Right the 1988 Education Reform Act brought about the marketisation of education.
What was the aim of the 1988 Education Reform Act?
Independence - reduction of direct state control allows schools to have control over their own affairs.
Competition - competition between schools for pupils raises standards.
Choice - parents and potential pupils are given the opportunity to decide where they attend. This raises diversity in schools and creates parentocracy.
What are league tables and what do they achieve?
The policy of publishing and ranking each school’s exam results league table ensures schools compete and improve in order to have the best spot and be the most attractive.
What is the disadvantage of league tables?
Gilborn and Youdell argue that the publication of league tables has led to an A to C economy and an educational triage.
What is an A to C economy?
Gillborn and Youdell believed that schools focus their time, effort and resources on pupils they see as having potential to get grade 5/C’s and above in order to boost the school’s League Table ranking.
What is an educational triage?
Schools put students into one of 3 groups, stereotypical views influence this decision:
- Students who can pass and achieve high grades regardless.
- Students with potential , who are helped to get a grade C or above.
- Students who are ‘hopeless cases’ and are left as they are doomed to fail.
What is Ofsted?
One form of marketisation policy is Ofted. Ofsted is an inspection department that measures how schools perform grading them on a scale from 1 (outstanding) and 4 (requires improvement). This gives parents an informed choice about where to send their student.
What was Gerwitz study?
Gerwitz studied 14 London secondary schools and found differences in parents’ capital lead to class differences in how far they can exercise choice of secondary school.
What are privileged choosers?
These are professional M/C parents who used their economic and cultural capital to gain educational capital for their children.
What are semi-skilled choosers?
Mainly W/C, but unlike the disconnected-local choosers, they were ambitious for their children yet lacked cultural capital.
What are disconnected school choosers?
Mainly WC parents whose choices were restricted by their lack of economic and cultural capital.
What is formula funding?
Schools are allocated funds by a formula based on how many pupils they attract.
As a result, popular schools get more funds and so can afford better-qualified teachers and facilities.
What is the disadvantage of formula funding?
Formula funding fails to help the weaker schools improve, as they lose money to their more successful rivals thus find it harder to match facilities and quality.
What is open enrolment?
Open enrolment gave parents the right to send their children to a school of their choice rather than just the nearest one. This creates parentocracy.
