Caribbean Education

Importance of Education

To the man-in-the-street Education is seen as:

The panacea for change and the promise of a better quality of life

To the politician education is seen as:

A solution to poverty alleviation, social mobility, equality of opportunity, social

problems, management of the changes in values system.

The key to productivity and human resource development

To the teacher, education is seen as:

That which should contribute to the development of the potential of the child to
contribute to the development of the nation and by extension, World
Development

The Caribbean

Relatively small population (21M)

Small land area

Limited natural resources

Range of diversity

High level of dependency on international forces

Economic vulnerability

Education Reform

The perceptions of the importance of education and the limitations faced by the Caribbean
both in terms of quality and quantity has resulted in education reform throughout the
Caribbean region

The implication of globalization makes it necessary to reform our education systems; for it
requires us to adapt our own education content to meet not only our local demands, but also
our international concerns.

Contributed by Mrs. Edwards

Major Challenges faced in the Caribbean

Economic

Youth unemployment

Skill shortages in key areas of the economy

New jobs associated with higher technology occupations requiring higher entry
levels

A mismatch between the graduates and the available jobs.

Social

Receding influence of the family

A conduit for the Illicit international drug trade

High crime rate and gang warfare

HIV/AIDS increasingly the cause of death rate for those between the age of 15
and 45 years

Information and Communication Technology (ICT)

How do we effectively integrate the new ICTs into all aspects of education
provision?

The Changing Environment

The nature and organization of work

The need for retraining and retooling

The important role of knowledge as a factor of production

The emphasis on Information Technology

Political

A robust democracy

Peace

A creation of a state of esteem

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 Educational

Existing curriculum content and pedagogical methods are being questioned

Students leave school ill-prepared for the world of work and adulthood.

High incidence of illiteracy and numeracy.

Marked gender differences in achievement.

Curriculum changes without the necessary changes in assessment

Untrained teachers at the Early Childhood, Primary and Secondary levels

Student under-performance

High levels of student attrition

Student repetition of grade levels

Harmonization of curriculum and assessment across the region

There seems to be no other alternative right now and in the near future for countries in
the Caribbean but to collaborate in all areas of development utilizing the new
technologies and benefiting from those that have begun the change process, at the
same time maximizing the resources at their immediate disposal.

WHAT ARE SOCIETAL INSTITUTIONS?

Societal institutions are tangible social organizations that satisfy basic and specific needs
of their members. Societal institutions exhibit widely held beliefs and norms engender
by socialization of members in particular ways. These institutions occur over several
generations and have an order that is indefinite.

WHAT IS EDUCATION?

Education is the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing

the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others
intellectually for mature life.

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 Education impacts on the culture of the Caribbean in that primary and secondary
socialization, which are forms of socio-cultural education, stimulate academic education
as a core value that every person should emulate. This results in education becoming a
way in which people structure their lives and how they behave. How education actually
works or is manifested in society is known as the real standpoint. In the real standpoint
education is a superstructure of social mobility, status and a means of attaining wealth.

EDUCATION AS IT RELATES TO SOCIETY AND CULTURE/ IMPACTS OF EDUCATION ON

CARIBBEAN SOCIETY AND CULTURE.

INDIVIDUALS

Education is expected to confer social mobility on individuals.

Many Caribbean students have moved through the different levels of education in
order to obtain professional occupations in the field of their choice.

Those with lower qualifications have been able to access technical, industrial and
clerical jobs. It is the belief of many individuals that the dominant ideas in the institution
of education were successful in overcoming their obstacles and securing credentials in
order to obtain a suitable job.

These credentials however have engendered feelings of low self esteem in those who
have failed to acquire them.

Education also demoralizes students who fail to achieve the expected grades and forces
them into a life of degradation. The institution of education is very competitive in
rewarding those with academic ability and the necessary social and cultural resources.

An individual without these qualities has fewer options to lay a foundation for his/ her
life for achievement.

GROUPS

Many people believe that schools have a middle class bias and are set up to reward
children who have the necessary cultural capital to succeed in the academic world.

This is because the lives of the middle class children are comprised of various
experiences because of their involvement in extra-curricular activities and their
interaction with different groups.

These children therefore bring considerable linguistic competence to their schooling as

opposed to lower class/ lower income students who are more competent in using
dialect than formal language.

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 The social institution of education therefore confers more challenges on children of
lower socio-economic groups than on those of the middle class because of their
background.

INSTITUTIONS

The social institution of education in the Caribbean has its historic interaction with the
social institution of religion.

Denominational groups have made serious attempts to provide education and parents
preferred to send their children to religious schools.

These religious elite schools soon became in high demand where only the very talented
were accepted.

The Parents recognized the importance of socialization, and they felt that the values
taught in religious schools will help their children to become better people.

This preference for religious schools had an impact on non-religious state schools as
these schools tend to be seen as less legitimate than denominational schools in the
business of socially educating children.

The dilemma for the state is that it is concerned with equity for all and not primarily
promoting religious values. That includes all the children no matter the religion or
academic ability.

Also called structural functionalism, is a theoretical orientation that views society as a

system of interdependent parts whose functions contribute to the stability and survival
of the system.

FUNCTIONALISM

The functionalist theory focuses on the ways that universal education serves the needs
of society. Functionalists first see education in its manifest role: conveying basic
knowledge and skills to the next generation.

Durkheim (the founder of functionalist theory) identified the latent role of education as
one of socializing people into society's mainstream.

This moral education, as he called it, helps to form a more-cohesive social structure
by bringing together people from diverse backgrounds.

Functionalists point to other latent roles of education such as transmission of core

values and social control. The core values in a student's education reflect those

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 characteristics that support the political and economic systems that originally fueled
education. Therefore, students will receive rewards for following schedules, following
directions, meeting deadlines, and obeying authority.

From the functionalist perspective, the theory of social mobility put forward can be
validated, as the lower classes of a previously alienated people have now risen to hold
powerful status positions in society through the empowerment of education. Afro
Caribbean ad Indo- Caribbean people can now be recognized worldwide because of
their intellectual ability. Education is associated not only with status but with
stratification as well as occupation. It can therefore be noted that education is a tool to
achieve status but unlike the historical notion, education is not based on colour or
ethnicity, and that it is based entirely upon the attainment of education.

FUCNTIONALIST PERSPECTIVE OF EDUCATION AS A MEANS OF SOCIAL MOBILITY

The system of economic and political thought developed by Karl Marx along with Friedrich
Engels, especially the doctrine that the state throughout history has been a device for the
exploitation of the masses by a dominant class, that class struggle has been the main
agency of historical change, and that the capitalist system, containing from the first the
seeds of its own decay, will inevitably, after the period of the dictatorship of the
proletariat, be superseded by a socialist order and a classless society.

MARXISM

The Marxist theory states that education is the main tool of the oppressor which continues the
separation of economic and cultural society. The position claims that education is a means of
continuing the False consciousness scenario, thus it is the continuation of an inferiority
complex directed towards the lower classes. Historically, the education system in a colonial
society encouraged the importance and superiority of the metropole and its social and cultural
institutions

THE MARXIST THEORY

Historically too even the curriculum was based on a metropole and this could be seen
then in geography and literature where the entire content of those subjects were
European in nature. This shows that the colonial master used education as a tool of
oppression rather than liberation.

Functionalist - division of labour

Education provides society with a 'division of labor', this means schools help identify
who will become a 'garbage collector/janitor' and who will become the
'solicitor/lawyer'.

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 Functionalist socialisation

Education socializes children with society's shared norms and values. This process of
socialization moves children away from the particularistic values of their home life to
towards the universalistic values of society and helps establish what functionalists term
a value consensus.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MARXIST AND FUNCTIONALIST PERSPECTIVES

Functionalist - hidden curriculum

The hidden curriculum helps to integrate future citizens into societies by 'teaching' and
reinforcing them with society's norms and values in order to establish a value
consensus.

Functionalist - meritocracy

Education helps provide the means for people to make themselves upwardly mobile.
Therefore if you make the effort you will be rewarded - meritocracy.

This process legitimizes social inequalities as functionalists believe everyone has the
opportunity to get qualifications.

Education/school is a level playing field, if you fail to achieve at school it is nobody's

fault but your own!

Marxist - social class

Unlike functionalists positive division of labour, Marxists stress that education helps
meet the needs of society by dividing it into distinct social classes - the ruling
(bosses/directors/managers) and working class (workers/underlings).

Marxist - socialisation

Unlike functionalists, Marxists stress that education doesn't socialise in an optimistic

way like functionalists believe to create a value consensus, but the opposite is true.
Education socialises children into becoming obedient workers as school simply passes
on ruling class' norms and values. In other words, schools pass on the dominant
ideology of the ruling class!

Marxist - hidden curriculum

Unlike functionalists' positive view of the hidden curriculum as helping to establish a

social consensus, Marxists argue that the hidden curriculum is a tool or instrument of

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 the ruling class. It is argued that it teaches the children to accept that society is unequal
and exploitative.

Marxist - social restrictions

Though functionalists see schools as a place of opportunity for social mobility through
individual effort, Marxists point out that schools simply reproduce social inequalities as
meritocracy is a myth. The ruling class benefit from an education system which meets
their needs by limiting the opportunities of the working- classes and thereby legitimizes
social-class inequalities. For example, few working class children go to grammar school
(a secondary education institution) and then go to Oxbridge (University of Oxford and
University of Cambridge)!

Contributed by Mrs. Edwards