Sociology Now, Census Update

EDUCATION, AS WE OFTEN HEAR, IS “THE GREAT EQUALIZER.”By studying hard, staying in

school, and applying yourself, you can gain the knowledge and skills you need to get ahead.

Education can enable a poor person to get out of poverty, can catapult you into ranks of the

wealthy and powerful. It’s the purest form of meritocracy; the smartest cream always rises to

the surface. Sometimes, when you hear parents or teachers talk admiringly about education,

it sounds as though getting a college degree is like winning the lottery.

Talk to others, and it sounds as if you’re in prison. Education is the best predictor of

your eventual position in the socioeconomic hierarchy—but the best predictor of your edu-

cation turns out not to be your motivation or intelligence but your parents’ level of educa-

tion. Education keeps you where you are, keeps the structures of inequality (based on class,

race, or gender) in place. In fact, education is what makes that inequality feel like a meri-

tocracy, so you have no one to blame.

So why do it? It depends on

whom you ask. Teachers often sub-

scribe to the meritocracy idea and

contend that education builds critical

reasoning skills and the ability to grapple with issues, weigh evidence, and make informed

decisions in a changing society. It is valuable in itself. Students are often more cynical and

more interested in learning the skills they will need to get or keep a job.

Does education level the playing field and facilitate mobility, or does it freeze things

where they are and maintain

the status quo? Should educa-

tion teach you how to think, or

how to make a living? Is it the

road to the good life, or does it

turn us into overintellectual-

ized snobs, corrupting good-

ness and simple virtues?

How do sociologists understand education? It’s both. Education is intrinsically interest-

ing, and you can gain useful skills to build your job credentials. It is a path of mobility and

one of the central institutions involved in the reproduction of structured social inequality.

Education

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Education is both one of the best ways

to enhance your upward mobility and

career opportunities and one of the

legitimizing institutions that maintain

social inequality.