1. Schools as Organizations
1.1. Governance
1.1.1. State Senators - Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions
1.1.2. House Representative - Robert B. Aderholt
1.1.3. State Superintendent - Thomas R. Bice
1.1.4. State School Board Representative - Cynthia Sanders McCarty
1.1.5. Local Superintendent - Cindy Wigley
1.1.6. Local School Board - President Bill Aaron
1.2. Comparison to one Country
1.2.1. The German educational system is a polar opposite of the United States. The Germans select and sort children at a very young age. Children are sent to three distinct secondary school systems. Some go to train for blue color jobs, others for low level white color jobs and the third school is a college preparatory system. The businesses work closely with the educational system to ensure trained specialized workers. Businesses working with trianing is something the United States could implement to help the country have bettrer trained workers.
2. Curriculum and Pedagogy
2.1. Historical Curriculum - Developmentalist Curriculum
2.1.1. Student centered.
2.1.2. Relating curriculum to children's needs
2.1.3. Schooling is related to life experience
2.2. Sociological Curriculum - Multicultural curriculum
2.2.1. Helps self esteem of minority groups
2.2.2. Can conflict with parental values
2.2.3. unique teaching material
3. Equality of opportunity
3.1. Coleman Study
3.1.1. Coleman's study found that the organizational differences between schools were not particularly important in determining student outcomes when compared to the differences in student-body compositions between schools.
3.1.2. Colman's findings caused a tremendous controversy.
3.1.3. James Coleman received an extremely large grant to study the relationship between the organizational characteristics of schools and student achievement.
3.2. Educational Achievement and Attainment
3.2.1. Female students achieve higher levels then male students in most areas
3.2.2. The white race tend to have higher reading scores then black and Hispanic.
3.2.3. The gaps between African Americans and Hispanics on one hand, and whites on the other have increased in mathematics since 1988.
4. Educational Inequality
4.1. Functionalists
4.1.1. Expect that the schoolings process will produce unequal results, but these results ought to be based on individual differences between students, not on group differences.
4.1.2. Believe that unequal educational outcomes are the result, in part, of unequal educational opportunities.
4.1.3. This perspective has been the foundation of liberal educational policy in the United States since the 1960s.
4.2. Genetic Differences
4.2.1. The most controversial student-centered explanation
4.2.2. Viewed as limited because social scientists believe that environmental and social factors are largely responsible for human behavior.
4.2.3. This research indicates that although social and psychological factors and crucial, biological factors cannot be ruled out entirely.
5. Educational Reform
5.1. Charter Schools
5.1.1. Public schools that are free from many of the regulations applied to traditional public schools, and in return are held accountable for student performance.
5.1.2. A charter school is paid for with tax dollars (no tuition charges) and must be open to all students in the school district.
5.1.3. Proponents of charter schools have long argued that they provide a more effective and efficient alternative for low-income children, especially in urban areas.
5.2. District Takeover
5.2.1. Can provide a good opportunity for state and local decision makers to combine resources for the good of the students well being.
5.2.2. Creates a healthy environment to address to Districts problems properly.
5.2.3. Takeover tends to undermine the local leaders and local administration.
6. Politics of Education
6.1. Perspective
6.1.1. In the Conservative point of view individuals must complete in the social environment to survive.
6.1.2. In the liberal perspective, belief is the capitalist economy is prone to recessions and government must intervene to help citizens.
6.1.3. The radicals believe democratic socialism is a fairer political system than free market capitalism.
6.1.4. The Neo-liberals believe in a complete school system overhaul.
6.2. Vision
6.2.1. Traditionalist believe schools should teach what was and what is.
6.2.2. Progressive believe schools should always be getting better and advancing into the future.
7. History of U.S. Education
7.1. Interpretation in the Standards Era
7.1.1. In the late 1970's conservatives begin to organize the liberal reforms of the 1960's and 1970's
7.1.2. The National Commission of excellence released a report in 1983 named "A Nation at Risk" citing high rates of adult literacy and inferior international test scores.
7.1.3. In the 1990's "charter school" legislation became popular in the United States in an attempt to improve the education system.
7.2. The emergence of the public high school
7.2.1. There was tension between educators over what were the must important subjects to be taught in high schools.
7.2.2. The national Education association a committee to establish college entrance requirements that would be excepted nationally.
7.2.3. Public high school enrollment grew from under 25,000 to over 6.5 million students in 65 years, 1875 to 1940.
8. Sociological Perspectives
8.1. Major Theoretical Perspective
8.1.1. Functional theory stresses the importance of society by emphasizing structures, programs and curricula as "well oiled machines"
8.1.2. Conflict theorist do not see relation between society and school as unproblematic
8.1.3. International theorist believe schools should be questioned and revised from a very deep level to get to the deeper more complex issues.
8.2. Effects of Schooling
8.2.1. The higher the social class of the student, the higher the achievement level, is a general truth about schooling effects.
8.2.2. The more academic orientated a school is, the higher the learning rates.
8.2.3. The more education a person receives, the more likely that person is to read more often, be liberal, and have high self esteem.
9. Philosophy of Education
9.1. Pragmatism
9.1.1. Generic Notion -
9.1.1.1. Progressive methodology requires a course of study that reflect their particular stages of development. Progressive ideas put the needs and interest of the child first. The child helps participate in planning his or her course of study, employ project method or group learning, and depend heavily on experiential learning.
9.1.2. Key Researchers
9.1.2.1. George Sanders Peirce, William James, and John Dewey
9.1.3. Goal of Education
9.1.3.1. Schools should balance the needs of society and community and also the needs of the individual. The school is a place where ideas can be practice with the goal of providing the students with the knowledge of how to improve the social order.
9.1.4. Role of the Teacher
9.1.4.1. The teacher is a facilitator and not an authoritarian figure. The teacher must have command of several disciplines in order to create implement curriculum.
9.1.5. Method of Instruction
9.1.5.1. Children shall learn both individually and in groups. Traditional blocks of time for specific discipline instruction were elimated.
9.1.6. Curriculum
9.1.6.1. Progressive schools generally follow a core curriculum.