ABSTRACT
Although unequal treatment in the classroom is not the only cause of unequal performance, it may well be a very significant cause. This would suggest that schools do not distribute opportunity evenly to all students, but unevenly according to how they are treated. Further, schools are not simply neutral proving grounds for individual talent and diligence; they are agencies which actively shape and expand differences between students. The conception of schools as a meritocracy is basically erroneous because it overlooks this aspect. (Jeffrey M. Blum, Pseudoscience and Mental Ability : The Origins and Fallacies of the IQ Controversy, 1978, pp. 170-1.)
Schooling processes and educational outcomes
In the previous chapter we stressed the significance of class, gender, race and ethnicity in affecting educational experiences and opportunities. Here we will consider in more detail the processes by which schools contribute to socially based patterns of unequal educational outcomes. Working-class students as well as many girls, many migrants and most Aborigines do not negotiate the demands of competitive schooling as successfully as do better-off students. We would point out also that much of what happens to students in schools can only be understood in terms of the more insidious effects of meritocratic ideology (see Chapter Three) and the credentialling in which schools are involved. Furthermore, a sociological
understanding of the complex nexus between school and an unequal economic structure (see Chapter Seven) and of the social construction of the curriculum (see Chapter Three), is also central to analysing what schools do to students. Practices such as testing (of IQ, ability or aptitude), streaming, examining, along with the competitive academic curriculum and the pacing of classroom instruction all affect students from varying backgrounds in different ways, while contributing to differential educational outcomes between individuals. An understanding of the production of these different outcomes requires a sociological analysis.
