Causes of Differential Attainment

Educational Attainment and Inequality

In this course, Dr Matthew Cole (University of Birmingham) explores patterns of differential educational attainment along class, gender, and ethnic lines. In the first lecture, we consider three sets of factors shaping unequal attainment – cultural, material, and factors within schools. In the second lecture, we think about differences in attainment between working- and middle-class students, and how these are shaped by material and cultural forces and relationships within schools. Next, we consider the “gender gap” in attainment, focusing especially on arguments that schooling has been “feminised” to favour girls and critiques of this position. In the fourth and final lecture, we look at the more complex ethnic patterns of achievement and explore their causes.

Causes of Differential Attainment

In the lecture, we think about patterns of differential educational attainment along class, gender and ethnic lines, and their causes, focusing in particular on: (i) cultural factors, such as attitudes towards school, as outlined by Functionalists and the New Right, as well as Marxists like Pierre Bourdieu; (ii) material factors, centred around students’ access to the resources needed to achieve in school; (iii) factors within schools, notably teacher labelling and school subcultures, which can both motivate students or discourage them from achieving highly.