Essay: Education can be heavily impacted by the social class of the surrounding area

21 September 2017, Word Count 1612
Module 1: Final
Education in today’s society can be heavily impacted by the social class of the surrounding area. Social class seems to be the source that most people evaluating education standards use to distinguish the expectations for education, its potential, and its power. Expectations regarding education and social class are correlated due to the amount of money going into the system. They believe that the amount of money going into any system of education can change its expectations.
The more money that is funneled into education, especially within a higher-class area, can determine the type of education provided for the students. Due to the higher influx of money in a high-class education system, schools can provide more tools such as teachers or class materials for the students to improve their education. Typically, these communities have better teachers in the district to help improve and prepare the attending students for further education in a college or university. Having more resources in a school system improves the students immensely with any struggles they might be having with the work being given. For example, in my school district students were given tutors that volunteered after school hours.
Given all these resources, the student can better themselves which helps better the school.
As Rose makes clear to us through blue collar workers, education also happens in the work place. He shows us this through is mother and how “the restaurant [she worked at] became the place where she studied human behavior, puzzling over the problems of her regular customers and refining her ability to deal with people in a difficult world” (Rose 1035). It shows that even if the school that a student attends doesn’t provide the learning they need or want they still learn through other forms just like Rose’s mother did at work.
Growing up in a diverse town, I experienced both the low and high-class society ranks in my small high school. I watched as some students walked in with the same uniform shirt they have been wearing for years, most of those students also couldn’t be a part of any clubs or sports because they would need to leave right after school to work and help support their families. By the same token, there were students who walked through the halls with the latest pair of Jordan’s and owed every color of the uniform, and every style the uniform sweater. Drawing out the student’s social rank brings out their parent’s which continues to bring out the overall town’s. Majority of students were considered lower-middle class. My school district wasn’t the wealthiest, however it still had a good education system providing several resources and extracurricular for student development. For example, they still continued to give students the opportunity to participate in the arts, which in most unhealthy districts were the first programs to leave. Concert band, visual arts, chorus, drama, and computer design was and continues to be offered to every student.
Being a part of the music department and the leadership positions within them, I found myself questioning as to why more school don’t offer these kinds of opportunities. I believe that the arts can help a student express themselves in ways that nothing else could. People in today’s society already use music as a way of expressing how they feel almost every day. In any kind of situation or emotion it seems to be this fixed structure of support and freedom. Think of when you’re feeling upset, what kind of music are you more likely going to listen to? When you are happy? When you are mad? It seems to be a way to escape your problems you may be facing at home, school, or work. I believe that my school can be used as a prime example of a district faced with diverse social class that still manages to juggle between the difficulties of benefitting its students.
Moving forward, having these resources and money to help better both the students and the education system in a higher-class community also gives it its own power. The state government wouldn’t have to intervene with the education standards in a higher-class system because within itself, various opportunities and resources would be provided for every student to have the same leveled chance of succeeding. Since the system meets the basic state standards, they now have the power to raise the values for their schools in the community. The expectations for any higher-class student is to continue on their education at an elite college or university and to succeed.
However, Staples believes that colleges are just showering student with A’s. Seeing as though that college is expensive making higher grades more appealing for students attending. “Faced with the prospect of crushing debt, students are treating grades as a matter of life and death—occasionally even suing to have grades revised upward” (Staples 1066). As any student would see this, it’s just a matter of is a student values their education. If the student cares about their education then they will strive to learn and succeed. Seeing as though that further education is expensive, higher-class students would be the ones more likely pursue it.
Contradicting with a higher-class school system is a lower-class one. One main difference consists of money flowing into the education systems to better prepare the students who attend them. A lower-class type of school unfortunately does not have as many resources to be given to a student attending. Due to the lack of study materials, more students will typically struggle more with school. This struggle that occurs within students then transfers onto the school.
In today’s society, a student is a mirror of the school and the education system they attend. If the student population is succeeding then so is the school. However, if majority of the student population is doing poorly, then the school will also be doing inadequately.  There is a correlation between the success of the school and the amount of money entering the system. Without money (lower-class schools) it is harder to provide all of the resources to better a student and the education that will be received. However, with more money (higher-class schools) it is easier to provide and material that each student needs.
Students in a lower-class education system aren’t really expected to continue to further their educations. They aren’t looked as able to continue not because of their ambition or education received, but because they can’t afford it due to their rank in social class. Since they can’t afford to continue on their education, they are expected to just start working. As stated by Mike Rose in his Blue-Collar Brilliance, “Intelligence is closely associated with formal education-the type of schooling a person has, how much and how long- and most people seem to move comfortable from that notion to a belief that work requiring less schooling requires less intelligence” (Rose 1036). This quote is stating that some people see education as the only factor of intelligence. This is showing how higher-class students that further their education is able to pursue higher leveled careers that will seem as though that they are more intelligent.
Referring back to lower-class education systems, the lack of materials provided to a student will ultimately lower a school’s average GPA. Standardized testing in every public school provided by the state is used to measure the overall education in a district. In the state of New Jersey, the test currently used to measure this is PARCC. Overall, lower-class schools will receive slightly lower scores then a higher-class one. If a school doesn’t meet the state average grade requirement, the state government is forced to step in try and help. Once the state steps in, the school district will lose some of its power. Until the school raises the average score coming from their students, the state will remain in power over the school.
Due to social class having a big part in education, there are dangers. To begin, one danger in a high-class education system is if there is a benefactor that continuously provides money to a school. This benefactor might now be given a piece of power. For the school to continue to receive his or her support they are granted some power in which some might use to establish their own set of standards for the schooling students receive. Moving forward, a problem that a lower-class student might face is if he or she wants to further their education but do not have the necessary materials because the school doesn’t provide it. Unlike the higher-class student, this learner does not have the resources or money to better their education.
Due to money, members of the higher-class community are able to receive a better education due to more resources and other school materials being provided. On the contrary, students that are in the lower-class learning community receive a more challenged education. Challenged, however, does not refer to the student but instead the circumstances that make receiving education more difficult, such as a school not being able to afford proper textbooks. Moreover, there are limits and dangers to the relationship between social class and education. All in all, social class does in fact help to define and shape people’s expectations for education, its potential, and its power.
Works Cited
Rose, Mike. “Blue-Collar Brilliance.” Everyone’s an Author, Montclair State
University Custom Edition ed., W.W. Norton and Company, 2016, pp. 1033–1041.
Staples, Brent. “Why Colleges Shower Their Students with A’s.” Everyone’s an Author, Montclair State University Custom Edition ed., W.W. Norton and Company, 2016, pp. 1065—1067.