Education plays an essential role in society and is the basis in which we learn about the real world, become socially aware, and most importantly shape our identity. It influences our personality, helps us understand who we are, and can inspire or discourage us in achieving our future goals. Being educated can make us better citizens not just within the society we live in, but in interacting with cultures and ideas that are different from us. However, there are obstacles to a comprehensive education in America. Homeschooling, although being very popular in America, is an obstacle for some because of denial of a comprehensive education and religious extremism. One obvious obstacle is resources and funding because in our society the community in which we live in greatly influences the resources that are available to the K to 12 grades. Also, the decision to socially promote students or not who may not be 100% academically ready for the next grade is an issue that requires attention as this it affects many disadvantaged students. Our society needs address these obstacles and find solutions for them to insure educational opportunities for all children.
Homeschooling can lead to diminished social skills and even criminal behavior when children lack the understanding of society’s norms. A structured formal education outside of the home can be beneficial for children whose parents aren’t capable of teaching them the right way and/or are facing their own problems. In “Educated: A Memoir”, Tara’s brother Shawn is a good example of what problems homeschooling can create. Shawn was taken out of regular school early in life school because his bipolar father was afraid of the Government run school system. Since he never got a normal education, he lacked the social skills and didn’t know what normal behavior is in society. He was jailed for fighting when after he left home at seventeen. As a result, he had to go back and live with his parents. He also had strange views of what should be normal behavior for girls. For instance, he thought Tara was a ‘whore’ using eyelashes and mascara. Chapter 13 of the book recounts the most horrifying incident in which Shawn chokes Tara, nearly killing her in front of their mother. He sees her “prance around Charles (her friend) like a prostitute” (Westover, pg. 116) triggering an extreme violent reaction. Like his father, Shawn thought young girls dressing up were like prostitutes. An isolated upbringing which includes homeschooling combined with parental mental problems and religious extremism can cause antisocial, abusive and criminal behavior. Socialization of children in a broad, open school environment is an essential role of education to prevent this type of behavior.
Homeschooled children are at a disadvantage as they go through the educational system because they don’t learn the most basic knowledge that is available to most students in a structured private or public school. In chapter 17 of “Educated: A Memoir”, author Tara Westover details her struggles at Brigham Young University. In her first year at BYU she thought her American History class would be easy, but her father only taught her the simple basics of the Founding Fathers. She couldn’t understand the class since her professor taught the “philosophical underpinnings”. She was taught basic facts, but never had an understanding of what it meant. The most dramatic and damning indictment of her homeschooling came in her Art History class in which she said to her professor in front of the class she didn’t understand the word “Holocaust”. Her friend in the class thought she was joking. Being homeschooled she was never taught its meaning. Later she was so ashamed not understanding the scale of 6 million people being killed in one of most important events of 20th century history she never raised her hand in the class again. Her homeschooling was a result of her father’s fundamentalist religious perspective based on ‘God’s wishes’ saying, “Homeschooling was a commandment from the Lord.” (Westover, pg. 156). Homeschooling can lead to a substandard education and feelings of shame and embarrassment as in Tara’s case. A structured formal education would prevent these problems.
Society should create rules and laws that address the issues homeschooling can cause such as lack of socialization, the ability to work in groups, and few social networks. “Educated” author Tara Westover was denied the chance to go to a regular school in childhood. She then faced a lot of problems in her first year at BYU. If she had the ability to control her education in her childhood, she wouldn’t have chosen homeschooling by her father. If her brother Shawn attended regular school he would’ve learned socialization skills that could’ve prevented his violent behavior. In the article, “The Civic Perils of Homeschooling.” Rob Reich says a possible risk from homeschooling is that children and parents can just do what they want; they will lose the ability to learn how to obey or respect others. His point is that whoever gets homeschooled won’t be a good citizen in America. His concern is homeschooled children “are least likely to share common educational experience with other children.” One possible solution is provided in the paper, “Homeschooling: Depriving Children of Social Development?”. The author says: “Child development specialists advise homeschooling parents that they should make room for activities outside the home.” Outside activities like Girls/Boy Scouts allow children to socialize with others. School sports teams are allowing homeschooled kids to participate. It should be a requirement that homeschooled kids participate in outside activities and that public schools include them to improve their socialization. The cost to society for children to miss out on these skills is too great to ignore.
The issue of homeschooling is specific to a small portion of society, but school funding is much larger societal obstacle for equal education in the United States because the quality of education is often dependent on the school district where one lives. Children who live in the wealthy areas have better public schools, higher per pupil spending and receive better education. The wealthier districts pay teachers more so they get access to the best teachers. The funding problem is common in America and especially in our local area. For instance, Palo Alto is one of the most expensive cities in the Bay Area and has some of the highest test scores and student funding in their schools. The housing there is so expensive most people couldn’t afford even a rental. In the online article, “Inequity in Funding of Public Education Raises Justice Issues” John Allen shows that governments in rich areas provide more funding so wealthy people’s offspring have a greater advantage. He writes, “In American public education, the status quo is a system that explicitly favors the offspring of the wealthy over poor and minority children. Because local governments provide almost half of the cost of K-12 education, differences in wealth among communities translate into disparate levels of resources for schools.” Clearly in America’s public schools there exists a system of unequal funding which perpetuates class divisions and inequality. Excellent students lose an opportunity to get into a good school because their parents are poor. It is unfair for them and also society loses the full potential of a talented person. Equitable funding on the both the State Federal level for all school districts is needed to address this problem and should not be the primarily addressed at the local level.
Though the funding obstacle to equal education is a severe problem in American public schools and a comprehensive funding solution is longer term goal, we can still find ways to overcome this barrier and give poorer students a better opportunity. In the “Introduction to Sociology” textbook chapter16, “Education,” the authors outline programs that are very useful to assist poorer kids to get better education. Programs such as Head Start and Charter School are possible solutions. Notably, they state: “The federal Head Start program, which is still active and successful today, was developed to give low-income students an opportunity to make up the pre-school deficit discussed in Coleman’s findings. The program provides academic-centered preschool to students of low socioeconomic states”(371). This program gives pre-school children of low income families an opportunity to participate in academically oriented classes which can overcome learning deficits. They add another possible solution: “Charter schools are self-governing public schools that have signed agreements with state governments to improve students when poor performance is revealed on tests required by the No Child Left Behind Act.” Charter Schools can give the opportunity for students of less well-off families to receive a quality and even specialized education as wealthier families as “some charter schools specialize in fields, such as the arts or sciences, while others are more generalized”(372). We should support programs such as Head Start and Charter Schools at the Federal, State and local levels. Innovative programs like these are a way to address the problem of unequal funding of schools.
Another area holding back disadvantaged kids is mandatory retention which forces the student to repeat a grade if certain requirements are not met. Most people view mandatory retention as necessary if a student’s grades are very poor. However, others have the view that the student should not stay in same grade because those students will create problems for other students. Upon further research, it becomes clear if a student didn’t learn enough from the class and can’t quite pass the grade, it’s not necessarily their fault and they would put less effort for their education if held back. In the online article, “Beyond Grade Retention and Social Promotion,” the authors say retention doesn’t help students at all and would cause more problems for them. They cite the research that “Holmes (1989) concluded that on average, the retained students displayed poorer social adjustment, more negative attitudes toward school, less frequent attendance, and more problem behaviors in comparison to groups of matched controls.” Retained students will not have motivation for class. Their negative attitude will create more problems because be affecting others students in school. Their negative social attitudes will be a harmful to society. Mandatory retention is not the right answer.
Effective instructional strategies are better than just mandatory retention or automatically promoting students. It is much better to evaluate the situation for each student individually. In the article, “Beyond Grade Retention and Social Promotion,” the authors provide thoughtful solutions. Preschool intervention, a comprehensive program to promote social and academic development, summer school and after school programs, parental involvement, early reading programs are all useful to help students to prevent problems beforehand. An early reading program would be quite valuable for students to learn reading skills that would be invaluable later in life. They write, “Reading is an essential skill for subsequent knowledge acquisition; thus, early reading interventions attempt to facilitate children’s reading skills before they fall behind and are subsequently recommended for retention. Structured early reading programs have been demonstrated to promote student success,” To prevent student retention, the strategy of early intervention and promoting good reading skills are essential. American society should embrace this strategy for disadvantaged children to have a better opportunity in life.
Barriers and obstacles in the education not only can harm a person’s entire life but creates serious problems for our entire society such as inequality in education, anti-social, abusive behavior, and class disruption in schools. There are solutions and alternatives to the problems created by homeschooling, lack of equitable funding, and mandatory retention of disadvantaged students. One of the significant social theories, Functionalist theory, views that education equips people to perform different functional roles in society. But unless the obstacles to educational are addressed, the functional roles needed for a harmonious, well-functioning society will be lacking and society itself will break down. Since education is so fundamental to society, it’s imperative that America addresses the educational system’s shortcomings to provide a better life for all children.
Works cited
Griffiths, Heather, et al. Introduction to Sociology. 2nd ed., Openstax, 2015.
Westover, Tara. “ Educated: A Memoir” Random House. 2018.
Reich, Rob. “The Civic Perils of Homeschooling.” Educational Leadership, vol. 59, no. 7, Apr. 2002, p. 56. EBSCOhost, ezproxyfh.fhda.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=6530555&site=ehost-live.
Lebeda, Samantha. “Homeschooling: Depriving Children of Social Development?” The Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues, Spring 2005, pg. 104
Allen, John. “Inequity in Funding of Public Education Raises Justice Issues. (Cover Story).” National Catholic Reporter, vol. 33, no. 26, May 1997, p. 3. EBSCOhost, ezproxyfh.fhda.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=9705186069&site=ehost-live.
Jimerson, Shane R., et al. “Beyond Grade Retention and Social Promotion: Promoting the Social and Academic Competence of Students.” Psychology in the Schools, vol. 43, no. 1, Jan. 2006, pp. 85–97. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1002/pits.20132.
education will change me 