ABSTRACT
The socialisation functions of schools have been discussed since their inception. Debates from at least the nineteenth century have contested the capacity of schooling as a prophylactic to prevent outbreaks of disorder among the young. It is now commonplace that young people spend up to one-quarter of their waking hours in formal education, so at the very least a school or college has considerable potential as an agent of social control. The school, then, takes its place alongside the family and the community in both polemical and research literature as a potentially powerful influence on the development of young people, including their involvement in offending.
