1. Sociological Perspectives
1.1. Schools, as well as parents, churches and synagogues, and other groups share children's perceptions of the world by processes of socialization.
1.2. Schools socially and culturally reproduce the existing society through the systematic socialization of its youngest members.
1.3. The concept of equal educational opportunity is a key element in the belief system that maintains that the United States is a land of opportunity where hard work is rewarded.
1.4. Schools, through such practices as tracking, academically stratify students by curricular placement, which, in turn, influences the long-term social, economic, and cultural destinies of children.
1.5. Difference between schools in terms of their academic programs and policies make differences in student learning.
1.6. Many other factors besides education affect how much income people earn in their lifetimes: these include type of employer, age, union membership, and social class background.
2. Philosophy of Education
2.1. Realists reject the Platonic notion that only ideas are real, and argue instead that the material world or matter is real.
2.2. Metaphysics, Epistemology, and Axiology
2.3. Both Plato and Aristotle believed that important questions concerning such notions as the good life, truth, beauty, and so on could be answered through the study of ideas, using the dialectical method.
2.4. Teachers should be steeped in the basic academic disciplines in order to transmit to their students the knowledge necessary for the continuance of the human race.
2.5. realists believe in objective criteria for judging the value of artistic and literary works. They support method instruction in order to give students the knowledge necessary to make these evaluations.
2.6. Curriculum for realists: Science and Math, Reading and Writing, and the Humanities.
3. Schools as Organizations
3.1. State Senators
3.1.1. Richard Shelby since 1987
3.1.2. Jefferson Sessions since 1997
3.2. DeKalb County Superintendent Hugh Taylor
3.3. International school systems are as complex as the U.S.; for instance, they also have department of education that is able to exert considerable influence over the entire educational system.
3.4. Another dimension apparent in comparative analysis is the relative selectivity of systems.
3.5. The relative selectivity of a school system is an excellent indicator of its exclusiveness or inclusiveness.
4. Curriculum and Pedagogy
4.1. Historical Curriculum Theory
4.1.1. The humanist curriculum reflects the idealist philosophy that knowledge of the traditional liberal art.
4.1.2. The social efficiency curriculum was a philosophically pragmatist approach developed in the early twentieth century as a putatively democratic response.
4.1.3. The developmentalist curriculum is related to the needs and interests of the student rather than the needs of society.
4.1.4. The social meliorist curriculum, which was philosophically social reconstructionist.
4.2. Sociological Curriculum Theory
4.2.1. Reject the objectivist notion that curriculum is value neutral; rather, they view it as a reflection of particular interests within a society.
4.2.2. It concentrates on the function of what is taught in schools and its relationship to the role of schools within society.
5. Educational Reform
5.1. School-Business Partnerships
5.1.1. During the 1980s, business leaders became increasingly concerned that the nation's schools were not producing.
5.1.2. The Walton Foundation has funded charter schools and voucher initiatives.
5.1.3. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has contributed hundreds of million dollars to small schools and more recently to teacher effectiveness.