Sociology of Education 

Cleveland State University

Professor Garot

Spring Semester, 2003

 

Instructor:  Dr. Robert Garot

Course Hours:  4:00-5:50, M, W

Room:  Rhodes Tower 314

Office:  Rhodes Tower 1640

Email:  garotrh@email.uc.edu

Office Phone:  (216) 687-4550

 

Contact Information

Feel free to email me, leave messages on my office phone number, or with Phyllis Clark in the Sociology Department Office, Rhodes Tower 1721, (216) 687-4500.  I am happy to meet with students after class, or before class by appointment.

 

Overview

Education is one of the most pervasive aspects of modern society, in which we all have significant experience.  This course will examine the ways in which the educational system in the United States has been shaped, and how that system in turn shapes us. 

 

It is essential that you wrestle with the readings for each week, and mull over how they apply to your own experience.  I hope to open new perspectives to you, and what transforms Ainformation@ into a Aperspective@ that opens up new ways of thinking is wrestling with what you encounter.  For each reading, I hope that you work to understand not just what the author is saying, but why.  What received wisdom is she or he trying to challenge?  With what ideas might they be competing?  What is their evidence?  I hope that you will enhance for yourself the value of what you read through the paired (and perhaps literally opposed) habits of mind of skepticism (AOught I really believe that?@) and suspended disbelief (AWhat if it were true?@). 

 

The idea is to foster an intense, searching class discussion.  A great deal of learning happens in discussion, when one=s new ideas, guesses, hunches, ideological convictions, and moral persuasions rub unexpectedly up against others=.  I will assist this process through my questioning in class, and want you to have challenged each reading so that you, in turn, can be challenged by others in class. 

 

Please feel free to discuss topics further with me after class, or before class by appointment.  Be sure to exchange phone numbers with two or three other students and form study groups. 

 

Required Texts

Arum, Richard and Irenee R. Beattie.  2000.  The Structure of Schooling:  Readings in the Sociology of Education.  London:  Mayfield Publishing Company.  (Referred to hereafter as AText.@)

Reader (Referred to hereafter as AReader.@)

The text is available at the campus bookstore, and the reader will be provided by me on the first week of class.  Thereafter, you may purchase it from Phyllis Clark during regular business hours.

 

Assignments

1.  Weekly Journals

As a participant in a Writing Across the Curriculum course, you will be given the opportunity to write, to receive feedback on your writing, and to improve your writing skills.  This course meets those requirements through your weekly journals, in which you will reflect critically on your educational experiences in light of the week=s readings.  Your journal should reflect that you have deeply read and considered the readings, and that you have found a way to apply those insights to your own experiences.  The length should be about two pages, and it must be type-written.  Journals are due at the beginning of each Thursday class session, unless otherwise announced.  Each journal will be worth 3% of your final grade, and one percentage point will be lost for journals not turned in on time (exceptions may be granted for the first two weeks of the course).  I do not accept papers submitted through email.  Prompts and suggestions will be provided for your journals throughout the course.  On selected weeks, to be announced in advance, a short quiz will substitute for the journal.

 

2.  Class Presentations

Each week, one team of students will be responsible for an oral presentation, discussing with the class their personal experiences and opinions on the weekπs topic.  The grade for this presentation will substitute for the journal grade for that week.

 

Exams

Questions on exams will be provided in a true/false, multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank, and short answer format.  You will have three short non-cumulative mid-terms and one final, each worth 20% of your grade; your lowest grade will be dropped.  The final will be cumulative, but it will focus heavily on the final weeks of the course.

 

Grading

Weekly Journals:         45%

Mid-Terms (2):           20%

Final:                           20%

Note that 105 points are possible.

 

A+  98-100     B+  88-89        C+  78-79       

A    93-97        B    83-87        C    70-77       

A-  90-92        B-   80-82        D    50-69       

A minimum grade of a ≥C≤ is required for credit in Writing Across the Curriculum.

 

Weekly Topics and Readings

Please note that the following schedule, including project and exam dates, is tentative, and may change based on how quickly we cover the material.

 

Part I:  Introduction

Week 1:  Contemporary Issues

January 13^th and 15th

Text:  David Berliner and Bruce Biddle, AThe Manufactured Crisis@ (45)

Reader:  Ray McDermott and HervÈ Vareene, pp. xi to xiv in Successful Failure

   Lisa Delpit, pp. 11-20 in Other People=s Children

 

Week 2:  The History of Schooling in the U.S.

January 20^th(holiday) and 22nd

Reader:  Jeannie Oakes, AUnlocking the Tradition@ in Tracking

   Linda McNeil, pp. 3-10 in Contradictions of Control

Text:  Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis, ABeyond the Educational Frontier@ (11)

            David Tyack and Elisabeth Hansot, AThe Rising Tide of Coeducation in the High School@ (12)

 

Week 3:  Status Attainment and the Social Mobility

January 27^th and 29^th

Reader:  Jay MacLeod, pp. 3-23 in Ain=t No Makin= It

Text:    Pitirim Sorokin, ASocial and Cultural Mobility@ (2)

Ralph H. Turner, ASponsored and Contest Mobility and the School System@ (3)

Peter M. Blau and Otis D. Duncan, AThe Process of Stratification@ (4)

 

Week 4:  Theories of Educational Systems

February 3^rd and 5^th

Text:    Max Weber, AThe >Rationalization= of Education and Training@ (1)

Randall Collins, AFunctional and Conflict Theories of Educational Stratification@ (10)

Pierre Bourdieu, ACultural Reproduction and Social Reproduction@ (6) 

 

Monday, February 10^th:

Mid-Term Exam #1

 

 Part II:  Structures of Stratification

Week 5:  Racial Segregation and Resource Inequality

Wednesday, February 12^th

Text:  James Coleman, AThe Coleman Report@ (15)

Christopher Jencks et al., AInequality in Educational Attainment@ (16)

            Jonathon Kozol, AThe Dream Deferred, Again, in San Antonio@ (17)

Gary Orfield, AThe Growth of Segregation@ (18)

Doris Entwisle et al., AThe Nature of Schooling@ (19)

 

Week 6:  Elite Schools

February 17^th(holiday) and 19^th

Text:  Peter Cookson and Caroline Hodges Persell, AThe Chosen Ones@ (13)

Reader:  Tiffany Chin, ASixth Grade Madness@

 

Week 7:  Inner City Schools

February 24^th and 26^th

Reader:  William Lowe Boyd, AWhat Makes Ghetto Schools Succeed or Fail?

    Michelle Fine, pp. 1-27 in Framing Dropouts

 

Monday, March 3^rd

Mid-Term Exam #2

 

Wednesday, March 5^th

Week 8:  Tracking

Text:  Maureen T. Hallinan, ATracking:  From Theory to Practice@ (20)

Jeannie Oakes, AThe Distribution of Knowledge@ (21)

Adam Gamoran, AIs Ability Grouping Equitable?@ (22)

 

March 8^th-16^th:  Spring Break

 

Week 9:  Labeling and the Self Fulfilling Prophecy

March 17^th and 19^th

Reader:  Ray C. Rist, AStudent Social Class and Teachers= Expectations@

   Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobsen, Selections from Pygmalion in the Classroom

 

Week 10:  Socio-Economic Status and Schools

March 24^th and 26^th

Text:  Hans-Peter Blossfeld and Yossi Shavit, APersisting Barriers:  Changes in Educational Opportunities in Thirteen Countries@ (23)

Paul Willis, AElements of a Culture@ (24)

Jay MacLeod, ATeenagers in Claredon Heights:  The Hallway Hangers and the Brothers@ (25)

Annette Lareau, ASocial Class Differences in Family-School Relationships:  The Importance of Cultural Capital@ (26)

 

Week 11:  Race and Schools

March 31^st and April 2^nd

Text:  Signithia Fordham and John Ogbu, ABlack Students= School Success:  Coping with the Burden of >Acting White=@ (27)

Amy Stuart Wells and Robert Crain, AConsumers of Urban Education@ (28)

Christopher Jencks and Meredith Phillips, AAmerica=s Next Achievement Test@ (29)

 

Week 12:  Gender and Schools

April 7^th and April 9^th

Text:  Roslyn Arlin Mickelson, AWhy Does Jane Read and Write So Well?  The Anomaly of Women=s Achievement@ (30)

Barrie Thorne, ABoys and Girls Together... But Mostly Apart@ (31)

Michael Apple, ATeaching and >Women=s Work=@ (32)

 

Monday, April 14^th:

Mid-Term Exam #3

 

Part III:  Classroom Dynamics

Week 13:  Discipline

Wednesday, April 16^th

Reader:  Michel Foucault, ADocile Bodies@

Text:  Emile Durkheim, AThe First Element of Morality:  The Spirit of Discipline@ (8)

 

Week 14:  Learning

April 21^st and 23^rd

Reader:  Jonathan Kozol, pp. 1-18 in Death at an Early Age    

   Jean Lave, AThe Values of Quantification@

   Sylvia Ashton-Warner, pp. 27-58 in Teacher

 

Week 15:  Deschooling

April 28^th and 30^th

Reader:  Paulo Freire, pp. 75-118 in Pedagogy of the Oppressed

   Ivan Illich, pp. 1-24 in Deschooling Society

 

Monday, May 5^th, 4:00-6:00 PM:

Final Exam

 

General Paper Writing Guidelines*

 

Format and Presentation

All journals should be about 2 pages long, give or take a few sentences. Page limits are important guidelines within which you should be able to treat a topic thoroughly. If your paper is too short it means that you didnπt address the question properly, if itπs too long it means you are rambling and lack editing skills.

 

Do not skip lines between paragraphs (like Iπm doing here). Use an easily legible font, 12-point size works in most types.  Papers must be typewritten, double-spaced with approximately 1" margins. Number all pages. Papers must be stapled. This means no plastic binders, no folding the edges together and no paper clips. Do not use a cover page.  The following information should appear on the upper right-hand corner of the first page: Name, student ID#, Date, Paper topic number, and Title.  Paper which egregiously fail to follow these guidelines will be returned to the author without a grade. 

 

General Organization

Academic papers have introductions, bodies, and conclusions. An introduction should be simple and explicit, and describe what you are going to do, and in what order.  It should provide a complete "road map" for the rest of the paper.  It is perfectly acceptable to use the first person voice and say, "I will focus on ...", after all who is writing this paper, anyway?

 

The body of the paper must be well organized. You must use paragraphs to divide your thoughts. A paragraph is a set of sentences with one common idea. Each paragraph should have a topic sentence and make one main point. Your argument should flow logically from one paragraph to the next. Please use subheadings if they are appropriate or help the reader navigate through different sections of the paper. I should be able to make sense of your paper, in a general way, by reading the introduction, the first sentence of each paragraph, and the conclusion.

 

For your conclusion, restate the paperπs highlights and take the opportunity to tie things up neatly. You may restate ideas from your opening paragraph. Repeat your thesis and briefly summarize the main evidence you have included. After reviewing your main points, you may speculate, include personal reactions, pose additional questions or suggest avenues for future research, and the like.  If you have some doubts about whether your format will work effectively for the assignment, please feel free to consult with me about it first.

 

Citation

This is sometimes tricky, but by this point in your academic career, it is essential that you do it correctly. It is expected that you will use material from the texts and lecture to analyze your subject. Thus, whether you use direct quotes or paraphrases, you must give credit to the authors of those words, when they are not your own.

 

If you cite a lecture, do it this way: (Lecture, 2/16/01). However, relying solely on lecture citations for material that is also in the readings reveals to me that your familiarity with the readings is inadequate. So you should be sure to prioritize. Where appropriate, always cite the original source and not my delivery of it in lecture.

 

In the text, directly quoted course materials from the textbook or reader should be cited in one of the following ways.

 

"The stereotypes that we learn not only justify prejudice and discrimination but also can produce the behavior depicted in the stereotype≤ (Henslin, 2001:331).

 

Or alternately:

 

James Henslin (2001:331) suggests that, "The stereotypes that we learn not only justify prejudice and discrimination but also can produce the behavior depicted in the stereotype.≤

 

Also, be sure to cite any ideas that you borrow, not just quoted text.  For instance:

 

Many analysts have noted how stereotypes may produce the behavior they depict (Henslin, 2001:331). 

 

When citing from the reader, use the author of the particular article, rather than Ferguson, who is the editor, as in the following:

 

≥The tourist industry prostitutes Hawaiian culture,≤ (Trask, 1996:90). 

 

Any direct quotation that is longer than three lines needs to be set off from the body of the paper by indenting and single-spacing. Since your papers will be double-spaced and indented only to begin paragraphs, you will see the contrast. Be careful to differentiate between what the textbook authors are saying themselves, and the other authors that they may in turn quote. Cite accordingly. Do not string quotes together without putting them in context with your own prose. When you use a direct quote, place it in the context of a sentence that includes an explanation of what the quote means and why it is useful in service of the point you are making.

 

You need not include full references in a bibliography. 

 

Style

In general, write as simply as possible. Never use a big word, when a little one will do. Big words donπt necessarily convey intellectual prowess – especially when they are awkwardly used. Your word choice should be appropriate to formal writing: no slang, and no contractions ("canπt", "donπt"), unless you are quoting others or it somehow better helps you to make your point. You must use words that actually exist, and words must be used correctly. Look up definitions and spellings if you are unsure.  Spell check often misses words.

 

Never refer to notions such as ≥truth≤ or ≥reality.≤  Your reader will decide, based on your evidence and arguments, on the veracity of your claims.  Hence, avoid statements such as, ≥It is true thatä≤ or that a certain claim or finding is more ≥real≤ or ≥realistic.≤

 

Avoid using the indefinite "you". You will notice that I am addressing these instructions to you; that is, I am using the second person. That is because I am giving these instructions to a definite person or set of persons. In your papers, unless you mean to address the reader directly, do not use "you" when you mean to use "one" or ≥we.≤ Refer to yourself as "I" instead of the royal "we." It is perfectly acceptable to use the first person singular in papers – it is not too informal. Use "we" for the author and the reader together: "We have seen how breeching experiments disturb our taken-for-granted notions about reality."  Never refer to ≥society≤ as an active agent (thatπs my pet peeve), as in, ≥Society requires that people follow norms.≤

 

Avoid "a lot" (and by the way itπs not spelled "alot"), and "very". Hemingway and Morrison do not need them, and neither do you. Donπt confuse "their/there/theyπre" or "itπs/its", or "to/two/too", or  were/weπre/where", etc. Also please differentiate between "suppose" and "supposed" – these are not interchangeable, and are almost always improperly applied. These are sets of words that give students trouble, so please be careful.

 

Try to avoid using "he", "his", or "mankind" to mean anyone or all in general. If for some reason you have a strong ideological commitment to using "he" as the generic, you may do so, but it is not accurate, and there are other options available. 

 

Make sure that nouns and verbs agree in number. Avoid sentence fragments. Make sure that the sentences you write have subjects and predicates. Verbs are also necessary. Do not leave a clause hanging without these necessary components. Avoid run-on sentences. Make sure that if you link things together in a sentence that you do so by using the proper connective words or punctuation marks. These kinds of mistakes can often be caught by reading your paper aloud. If it sounds wrong, it probably is.

 

Always follow the parsimony principle.  That is, use as few words as possible to make your point.

Process

One way to start is by saying your ideas out loud, and writing them down. Just get the words out of your head and onto the page where you will be able to work with them more easily. I strongly suggest that you write more than one draft of your paper.  Most successful papers are begun well in advance of the night before the assignment is due. The best way to start is to just spew out a messy first draft, getting all of your ideas and facts down on paper (if you write long-hand) or your computer screen (if you prefer to word process). Then, a second draft will help you to organize the sections, focus your argument, and refine the content and style.

 

You must be at this point before you come to see me about your paper. Although I will be unable to read entire drafts, I may be able to discuss with you specific parts of your thesis or analysis, and/or help you with difficulties in transitions between ideas or sections of your argument. A final draft is useful for correcting spelling and grammatical errors, and for formatting the paper. You must proofread your own paper. It is not acceptable to turn in a paper with typographical errors, misspellings, nouns and verbs that do not agree, misused words, run-on sentences, sentence fragments, etc. You may want to rewrite the beginning or end of your paper in the last draft. Often in composing your paper, you will have changed your focus or ideas somewhat by the time you finish. You will want to make sure that these changes are reflected in a new version of your introduction or conclusion.

 

Finally, re-read your own paper and imagine that someone else wrote it. Does it make sense? Fix it, if it doesnπt. You may also want to get someone else to read your paper and give you comments. It is often hard to be objective when you are so close in the writing process. If you have trouble with your writing, get help. I am happy to help you in office hours or by appointment, and the campus has a variety of tutoring services available to you.

 

Good luck, and start writing now!

 

 

*This document adapted with thanks from Dr. Kerry Ferris' Case Study Essay Guidelines.