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Learning Objectives
- To identify barriers to formal education.
- To recognize the importance of equalizing access to formal education.
- To recognize the effects of unequal access to formal education.
- To analyze how the education system perpetuates inequality.
- To examine how the impact of gender has changed in education.
- To evaluate strategies of resistance in equalizing access to formal education.
Summary
Introduction
Enrolment at colleges and universities in Canada has increased consistently over the last four decades. Education is one of the most effective ways to increase an individual’s social mobility, and in that sense, it is a form of survival capital. However, not everybody has equal access to formal education. While the most significant barriers are at the postsecondary level, the roots of educational inequality begin much earlier.
Theoretical Perspectives on Access to Formal Education
Functionalists view “the school” as a social institution that performs the important role of socialization. From the functionalist perspective, schools are fair, neutral testing grounds that create equal opportunity and social mobility and provide the basis for a meritocracy. They provide rewards (credentials) that are proportional to an individual’s ability and effort. Social problems occur when schools fail to perform their manifest functions, including socialization, transmission of knowledge, change and innovation, and cultural assimilation. The education system may also have unintended latent functions, for example, a disconnect from nature.
Conflict theory highlights social inequalities in education, arguing that certain groups are favoured over others based on class, race, and gender. Formal education brainwashes students under the guise of socializing them, stigmatizes certain students to “assimilate” them, regulates people rather than integrating them, and makes certain kinds of knowledge exclusive.
Symbolic interactionists are interested in the meanings people attach to education. For example, they might study the structure of favouritism in classrooms, cliques and bullying, or the “code” that defines who is popular or unpopular. They are also interested in the labels society attaches to education and to “educated people” versus “uneducated people.”
Feminist theorists are concerned with the extent to which the school system produces and perpetuates social and economic disadvantages for girls and women. Feminism has focused on the removal of barriers toward subject preference, occupational choice, and decisions surrounding sex and gender roles.
The Present-Day Inequalities of Access
Today, many working- and middle-class families do not experience significant intergenerational mobility. In developed nations with large urban middle classes, higher education is a norm and working-class jobs are scarce. As more people become educated in these nations, an “opportunity trap” emerges: when everyone seeks the advantage of a higher education to get ahead, it is no longer an advantage. So as more people have gained qualifications, traditional middle- and upper-income jobs have become less widely available.
When every candidate for a job has a postsecondary degree, employers take other variables into account, including “soft skills” such as professional bearing, punctuality, dependability, persistence, and networking skills. White, middle- and upper-income parents are usually better able to pass on these soft skills. Moreover, many working-class students must work while in school, cutting into their time to study and placing them at a disadvantage. They may also struggle to use the resources available to them and may not feel as though they “belong” within postsecondary institutions.
Many young people in developed countries are now highly educated, frustrated, and disappointed. Limited career opportunities and mounting student debt have led to unemployment and underemployment. These trends may lead to a resurgence of class politics in Canada.
Low-Income People in Canada
Family income can affect access to (and quality of) formal education at all levels. Data from the EDI reveal that 25 per cent of kindergarten students in Canada are considered “vulnerable” on one or more domains. Early vulnerability predicts lifelong health, learning, and behaviour, and vulnerability is associated with family income and neighbourhood socioeconomic variables.
Primary school children from wealthier families are more likely to get homework help from skilled tutors and engage in extracurricular activities. Family income has also been linked to home environments that promote learning. On the other hand, low-income students are especially vulnerable to certain learning challenges. Teachers who teach mainly low-income students spend less time on instruction and more time on classroom management, meaning that students are given fewer opportunities to achieve.
Social, cultural, and human capital also play a role. For example, parents from lower-income families are less likely to engage in activities at their child’s school, often due to long work hours. Wealthy parents, especially those who have spent considerable time in school themselves, are better able to pass on necessary academic skills to their children. They have more time to spend with their kids, read to their kids, and generally speak more to their kids.
Students whose parents completed university are more than twice as likely to complete university themselves as people whose parents did not. Parents with higher incomes and a postsecondary education are more likely to save for their children’s schooling and promote a “family culture” of education. Meanwhile, students from low-income families may have to work while attending school in order to cover rising tuition fees and the opportunity cost of spending years studying instead of earning. Many of these students also take out student loans, which eventually need to be repaid. People who are paying off a loan are less able to invest, save for retirement, buy their own homes, or save for their own children’s education. Ultimately, the availability of loans has not levelled the playing field among people from different social class backgrounds, and the question of “who should pay for higher education” remains contested.
Rural Students in Canada
Postsecondary institutions are overwhelmingly in large Canadian cities, especially in the most-populated provinces. Distance from a university often decreases university participation, especially for people from low-income families, because of the cost of living far away from home. Today, online courses eliminate the factor of geographic distance, but they also reduce student involvement, course completion, and grades attained.
Boys and Young Men
Across the country, women are outnumbering men at the postsecondary level by over 10 per cent. Women face fewer barriers in this institutional setting than in the past, even though their academic achievements do not always translate into equal earnings. Thus, sociologists have begun to examine why fewer young men are pursuing postsecondary education.
This gender difference begins in primary and secondary school. Girls are earning higher grades overall while boys are scoring much lower on standardized tests. Boys do not show the same aptitudes in reading and writing. They are also more likely to have behavioural problems, repeat a grade, and drop out of school altogether. One theory suggests that the new interest in promoting girls’ skills has resulted in a feminization of education that alienated young boys. Others point to the shortage of male primary school teachers as part of the problem. Finally, some theorize that boys’ underperformance results from their overmedicalization, as more boys are being diagnosed and treated for learning disabilities like ADHD. Ultimately, poor performance in secondary school affects the strength of college and university applications, limiting the academic pursuits of young men.
Older Students
For various reasons, some people delay their postsecondary education. About one-third of Canadians aged 18–64 report having unmet educational needs or wants. Entering postsecondary education as an older student presents some unique obstacles, including managing family responsibilities that leave less time and money to spend on education. However, middle-aged people are increasingly going back to school as they find themselves in need of more education to start a new career or upgrade their employability.
People with Disabilities in Canada
Disabilities differ greatly in the way they affect a person’s access to education. A disability may require a person to enroll in school part time, meaning that completing their education will take longer and be more expensive. It may also result in unplanned school absences, which often lower marks. Increasingly, postsecondary institutions are developing services for students with disabilities, but many students still face obstacles and shortages of accommodations. Even when they are available, securing accommodations can be complicated and expensive. Some students with disabilities also need more time to complete their schoolwork, and this means less time for part-time jobs. These students must repay a greater debt load after they graduate.
Postsecondary institutions are reporting an increase in the number of students with disabilities. Students today are much more likely to seek support for a wide variety of learning disabilities and mental health disabilities. This is due to improved diagnostic tools, more support in schools, and the efforts of educators and activists to de-stigmatize disability.
However, the postsecondary participation rate among Canadians with a disability is still much lower than for other Canadians, and only half as many graduate from high school. People with disabilities encounter barriers that stem from how society perceives and treats disability. Views about disability impact government funding, which varies between provinces and territories. Other students and teachers may have prejudiced and stereotypical ideas about the accommodations that students with a disability are entitled to. Finally, people with invisible disabilities that are not immediately obvious often don’t get the support they need.
Immigrants in Canada
The barriers to education for immigrants, especially those who have recently arrived in Canada, are cultural, linguistic, and financial. However, young immigrants and the children of immigrants often seek postsecondary education at higher levels than non-immigrant Canadians and are often more educated than their parents, despite these barriers. One concern is that those with the highest motivation and expectations are also most likely to suffer from anxiety, loneliness, and depression, so we must remain alert to mental health when pushing children to excel at school.
Indigenous Peoples in Canada
Indigenous Peoples in Canada are far less likely to have a diploma or degree at or above the bachelor level. In the primary grades, Indigenous students often score much lower than other Canadian students on performance indicators. The gap widens in secondary school, where the dropout rate for Indigenous students is much higher than that of non-Indigenous students.
One barrier for Indigenous students is the legacy of residential schools, which left many with a deep mistrust of mainstream educational institutions. The Indigenous population in Canada is also at higher risk of having a low income, and Indigenous youth in Canada are more likely to have parents who did not attend postsecondary education themselves. The lack of employment opportunity on reserves is another factor that influences the educational gap. Finally, some Indigenous populations show higher levels of disabilities, meaning schools require additional resources to provide comparable educational opportunities.
Many Indigenous communities in Canada today are incorporating Indigenous culture and languages in their school curriculum, hiring Indigenous teachers, and engaging family and community members. However, these initiatives can be costly.
LGBTQ+ People in Canada
Schools are often not safe spaces for LGBTQ+ students. LGBTQ+ high school students are routinely subjected to discrimination, including disparaging and homophobic language, belittlement, sexual taunting, and verbal, physical, and sexual harassment. Students who witness harassment often do not intervene to stop it, while victims may be afraid to report incidents. Often teachers do nothing, and when they intervene, they appear ineffective. Parents’ attitudes can also contribute to hostile educational environments. LGBTQ+ students who are targeted by harassment often have lower grades, lower progress to postsecondary education, higher rates of skipping school because of safety concerns, higher rates of risky behaviour, and higher rates of depression and suicidal ideation than non-LGBTQ+ students. In recent years, provincial governments have made some changes in policies centred on detecting and addressing homophobic bullying, violence, and exclusion.
Consequences of Unequal Access to Education
Educated people are healthier, more securely employed, and more prosperous than less-educated people. However, access to educational credentials is unequal from the start. In addition, most top North American universities are designed to train researchers and produce research findings, with only a small emphasis on undergraduate teaching. At the same time, a persisting problem for secondary schools and universities is youth subculture. Generally, schools reflect the communities and community values in which they are embedded. Student bodies today are more diverse, fragmented, and conflictual than in previous generations. Among teens who do focus on academic achievement, levels of stress and anxiety are high.
Strategies of Resistance
In the Northwest Territories, the territorial government’s Indigenous Student Achievement Education Plan aims to close the gap in education between Indigenous and non-Indigenous students. It focuses on getting more Indigenous families involved in educating their youth and integrating Indigenous languages and culture into the education system. Finally, it hopes to have Indigenous youth meet the admission requirements for university or college education at the same rate as non-Indigenous students.
The Breaking Barriers campaign in Ontario shows how certain groups in society are often underrepresented in postsecondary education and works to address multiple barriers to education at the same time. It promotes early outreach programs, primary and secondary school outreach, enrichment programs, and bridging programs.
At the individual level, Dan Savage created a YouTube video to inspire hope for LGBTQ+ youth who face harassment. The project has now become a worldwide movement, receiving approvals from celebrities and important figures. The project has published a book and created a website where LGBTQ+ youth can come together and receive support.