With meritocracy being implemented in the Singapore’s education system, equality among students can be achieved. Meritocracy can be defined as enabling everyone to have an equal chance to achieve success regardless of their socio-economic backgrounds. This is especially important for Singapore; whose main resource is its people. Hence the selection of the cream of the crop in Singapore’s education system is non-discriminatory and instead based on students’ efforts and achievements. Therefore, I believe that meritocracy promotes equality in Singapore’s education system to a large extent, by providing opportunities for the students to achieve success in a non-discriminatory manner and by implementing the principle of Reward for Work; Work for …show more content…
This meritocratic system ensures that wealthy children gets a head-start over their peers. They can afford to attend premium institutions as compared to children from lower-income families, who receive a lower brand of childhood education. This results in very different starting points for these groups of children when they enter primary school, which might affect their chances of success in education. However, I disagree that the quality of childhood education has a huge bearing on a child’s success in education. While it is undeniable that a quality childhood education will better a child’s future education prospects, it is not a primary mean for a child to achieve educational success. For instance, in the past few years, the top scorers of the Primary School Leaving Examinations (PSLE) had consistently comprised of students from both the elite and neighborhood primary schools. This shows that quality childhood education shapes only the start, but not the outcome of a child’s education. A quality childhood education will not necessarily guarantee future educational successes. Ultimately, the onus is on the child if he wants to be successful in his education. Therefore, meritocracy helps promote equality as children who do well in their PSLE can further their studies in better secondary schools since admission is based on
Children who are deemed poor, do not receive nearly as many educational opportunities as children who are deemed rich. Kozol acknowledges that poor children barely have any social skills, which will help them in Kindergarten. In contrast, children who have been in preschool like programs since their toddler years, are more likely to develop social skills and have early-learning skills, like knowing how to hold a crayon. Children in all social classes, in the United States have to take the same standardized tests and are measured on the same grading scale. Kozol questions, “Which of these children will receive the highest scores?”(Kozol 413) Sadly, poor children will not be the ones with the highest score, and they will be held accountable for their test scores, as Kozol points out “There is something deeply hypocritical about a society that holds an eight year old inner city child “accountable” for robbing her of what they gave their own kids six or seven years earlier” (Kozol 413). It is unfair to expect a child to perform on a test equally with other children who started their education earlier. Kozol mentions that some people, who are well-educated, feel that money is not a problem with education inequality, and that other factors such as, “The values of the parents and the kids themselves must have a role in this as well-you know, housing, health conditions,
The education of privileged children was all about preparing boys for their future career. Members of the affluent society always wanted to send their childr...
The fourth chapter in Putnam’s Our Kids is titled “Schooling”, and it focuses on how education plays into class inequality. The argument is that while schools do not cause the opportunity gap between poor kids and rich kids, the schools allow it to grow. Putnam claims, “schools as sites probably widen the class gap,” (182). How the schools act as these sites, is based strongly on the physical segregation of rich people from poor people.
Otherwise, why now the parents spend a lot of money to send their children to a good school to study, because the school education environment to the children’s influence is very important. When Wes A moved to Bronx, his mother had made a decision to send her children to private school after her seeing how poor the public school system had become, so she worked multiple jobs to manage the cost and relied on her parents to take care the children before and after school while at work. “My mother decided soon after our move to the Bronx that I was not going to public school. She wasn’t a snob, she was scared.”(47) Because she knew, if the children are growth of a bad education environment, the children of the world to know nature will be distorted. Without a good education, there is also no habits; No good sense, and also there will be some bad behavior. Today, the rate of crime is high; almost all can find the root cause of their growth environment. Maybe the lack of discipline, discouraged by mistake friends or too much stress, but all shows the importance of good education environment for children to grow
Society holds a beneficial belief that education is a very prominent source that is necessary to engage in life’s successes. Education gives one the endurance to gain knowledge and the will power to accomplish goals and reach high standards. It allows individuals to know and understand the skills of life and the values it hold. Education has a history that has been around for hundreds of years that continuously develops as education improves, but the history of equal opportunity in education must continuously improve as well. Although education is known for its good deeds, inequality still plays a significant role in education today. There are opportunities that students must receive to relinquish some inequalities that are still present in education today. There are ways to address these obstacles and also ways to contribute to advanced opportunities to make education of equality.
Before entering into defense of the argument, it is important to communicate that the current situation is one which demands reform. It must be understood that the state of the public school system is not simply confined to the domain of education but is instead very much interrelated with the distribution of wealth. The current opportunity gap-which affords those who are middle and upper class greater access to higher quality education-is the cause of the inequality seen in the distribution of income. “Children born into the top fifth of the income distribution have about twice as much of a chance of becoming middle class or better in their adult years as those born into the bottom fifth (Isaacs, Sawhill, & Haskins, 2008)”.
Politics and business influence have been a long term problem for the establishment of a free and fair education opportunity. America has been called ?the melting pot? of the world, meaning that within the nation live such an abundance of individuals from different aspects of life. Within the world, we find some societies less fortunate than other societies. Economic diversity is present within the United States as well. It is commonly understood that the wealthy are becoming better educated than the poor, and similarly that the wealthy have a better chance to survive in the economic growth of today?s society.
Meritocracy, unlike aristocracy, is the system in which talented people are rewarded and promoted to leadership positions based on their merit. According to James Whitehurst, meritocracy “now refers to organizations where the best people and ideas win.” However, as true as it may sound, meritocracy in America is still a myth and is not a certainty. In the article “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Backpack,” McIntosh’s disdain of meritocracy when she described as “I must give up the myth of meritocracy.” She mentioned the meritocracy myth because in reality, many people who lack talents and experience can still climb the upward mobility ladder and become wealthier while the rest of
Children who are poor do not receive nearly as many educational opportunities as children who are rich. Kozol acknowledges that poor children barely have any social skills, which will harm them in Kindergarten. In contrast, children who have been in preschool-like programs since their toddler years are more likely to develop social skills and have early-learning skills, like knowing how to hold a crayon. Children in all social classes in the United States have to take the same standardized tests and are measured on the same grading scale. Kozol questions, “Which of these children will receive the highest scores?”(Kozol 413) Sadly, poor children will not be the ones with the highest score, and they will be held accountable for their test scores, as Kozol points out “There is something deeply hypocritical about a society that holds an eight-year-old inner-city child “accountable” for her performance on a high-stakes standardized exam but does not hold the high officials of our government accountable for robbing her of what they gave their own kids six or seven years earlier” (Kozol 413). It is unfair to expect a child to perform on a test equally with other children who started their education earlier. Kozol mentions that some people, who are well-educated, feel that money is not a problem with education inequality, and that other factors such as, “The values of the
The Quality of a child’s education often either limits or opens up a world of opportunities. Those who study the purpose of public education and the way it is distributed throughout society can often identify clear correlations between social class and the type of education a student receives. It is generally known by society that wealthy families obtain the best opportunities money can buy. Education is a tool of intellectual and economical empowerment and since the quality of education is strongly influenced by social class, a smaller portion of the American population obtains the opportunities acquired from a top notch education. Many people believe that educational inequalities are perpetuated from the interests of specific classes, but some researchers like John Gatto believe that there are even stronger social forces in play. In the essay “Against Schools” the author John Gatto presents three arguments: (1) that are educational system is flawed, (2) that the American educational system is purposely designed to create a massive working class that is easy to manipulate, and (3) alternative teaching methods should be applied to teach children to think for themselves. In this essay I will be summarizing and relating each of these arguments to other educational essays. Also, I will be discussing the strengths and weaknesses of the author’s argument.
Besides being a contradicting and unstable ideological discourse (Lim, 2013), ontologically, meritocracy is a dualistic construct (Robinson, 2012), and with problems. Its two elements of elitism and egalitarianism are, in my view, independent and competitive. With one being more than likely to dominate over the other, and in this case - the elitist one. Meritocracy is rooted in the ideas of Darwinism (Wong, 2013) which coining the term – “Survival of the Fittest” (Darwin, 1869, p.92), with those who are more talented or stronger gaining dominance over the rest in competitions (Darwin, 1869), and for their self-interest. (Hayek, 1948) Historically human society has evolved and organized along this linear pattern of having the best or the strongest to be at the top of a pyramidal hierarchy through competition. If this is the premise for meritocracy, then, elitism and not egalitarianism is the dominant strand in the ideological discourse of meritocracy. Meritocracy then merely provides a more humanistic packaging for this human evolutionary theory. If this is so, egalitarianism could not be looked upon to correct the excesses of meritocracy, with elitism being the dominant strand. I would think that in ...
This is rise to the top is achieved by all of those that are deserving, all who are able to demonstrate ability, despite their individual race, class, gender, or any other characteristic that is not based on merit. The purpose of a meritocracy, rather than a bureaucracy, is to form a class of elite individuals that are expected to be the most qualified in their line of work (Hayes 2012; 31, 53). In addition to assigning the best people to their respective positions, the meritocracy is also used to instill in people a sense of social belonging and order. When a person is placed in their respective class in society, it is done with careful precision that takes into account only the person’s true worthiness i.e. their merit (Young 1994; 97). The certainty of one’s place in a meritocracy leads to how this concept can be viewed as an
...tudents in high-poverty schools. Indeed, low-income students given a chance to attend more-affluent schools performed more than half a year better, on average, than middle income students who attend high-poverty schools” (Kahlenberg, Middle Class Schools for All 2). From this data, it is clear to see that the type of school is what matters most, not income. Ones social income class should not be used to determine their intelligence, but to only advertise their yearly salary.
Our education system allegedly provides an equal opportunity to all members of society to reach their potential. The research by Richer, particularly in elementary school, leads us to believe that this is not essentially the case. Our school system has a “hidden curriculum” that produces an inequality between the middle and lower class as well as men and woman. When a child enters a school environment they are required to adhere to a set of values proposed by the teacher and classroom environment. This school environment is competitive, teachers r...
In an education journal, Anyon (“Social”) provides the reader with the concept that there are four different types of schools, working class schools, middle-class schools, affluent professional schools, and executive elite schools, after observing five schools. The working class schools are made up of parents with blue-collar jobs, with less than a third of the fathers being skilled, and the majority of them being semiskilled or unskilled. “Approximately 15 percent of the fathers were unemployed… approximately 15 percent of the families in each school are at or below the federal ‘poverty’ level…the incomes of the majority of the families…are typical of 38.6 percent of the families in the United States” (Anyon, “Social”). In a more recent study conducted by Anyon (“What”, 69), she states that,