ED 069 022

AUTHOR $TITLE

INSTITUTION

DOCUMENT RESUME

EA 004 424

Little, AlanChanges in Secondary and Higher Education. BackgroundStudy No. 6. Conference on Policies for EducationalGrowth. (Paris, France, June 3-5, 1970.)Organisation for Economic Cooperation andDevelopment, Paris (France). Committee for Scientificand Technical Personnel.

REPORT NO OECD-STP-70-11PUB DATE 12 May 70NOTE 47p.

EDRS PRICEDESCRIPTORS

ABSTRACT

MF-$0.65 BC-43.29Administrative Organization; Continuous Learning;Economic Development; Educational Planning;*Educational Policy; *Enrollment Rate; *EqualEducation; Foreign Countries; *Higher Education;Manpower Needs; Organizational Change; Post SecondaryEducation; *Secondary Education; Social Change;Student Participation; Teaching Techniques; UniversalEducation

Member countries of the Organisati cn for EconomicCooperation and Development have experienced three changes inpost-compulsory education over the past two decades: (1) prolongedsecnndary education has become the experience of a rapidly growingproportion of the population, (2) the' proportion, therefore, of theage group entering some form of higher education has increased andwill continue, and (3) as the proportion entering and completinghigher education increases, so the numbers undertaking studies at annadvancedu (e.g. graduate school) level will increase. In most cases,these trends are the result of conscious policy decisions thatrepresent the desire of governments to maximize talent utilization,equalize opportunities, and increase the educational participation ofcertain underprivileged segments of society. This wider participationhas led to important changes in both the external organizationalstructures and in the internal curriculums (including methods ofteaching and assessment) of higher education. This -growth in scaleand cost raises important questions about controlling the highereducation system and about the role held by education in the socialsystem. Related documents are: ED 057 470, EA 004 323, EA 004420-423, and EA 004 425..(Author/JH)

ORGANISATION FOR ECONOMICCO- OPERAT ION AND DEVELOPMENT

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH.EDUCATION & WELFAREOFFICE OF EDUCATION

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Paris, 12thMay, 1970

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COMMITTEE FOR SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL PERSONNEL

CONFERENCE ON

POLICIES FOR EDUCATIONAL GROWTH

Backgnund Study No. 6

CHANGES IN SECONDARY AND HIGHER EDUCATION

The attached report is one of a series ofBackground Studies prepared by the Secretariat for theConference on Policies for Educational Growth. It hasbeen written by Alan Little.

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CHANGES IN SECONDARY AND HIGHER EDUCATION

Summary

Most types of post-compulsory education in Westerncountries have experienced increases in enrolments over thepast two decades. However, equally important as the voluntaryexpansion have been the conscious policy efforts to stimulatefurther expansion in enrolments. A critical factor in thispolicy decision has been the desire-of) governments to obtainnot merely more students and pupils in higher education (fora combination of the economic reason of maximising talentutilisation and the social justice desire to equalise opportu-nities); but also the wish to obtain wider and more effectiveparticipation of certain sections of society in full-time,prolonged education - especially the under-privileged groups.Partly as a means of meeting the demand for additional places,partly as a response to the growing numbers of pupils andstudents, fundamental changes have taken place in the nature ofthe educational experience. With the variety of educationalsystems that exists in Member countries, one set of ideas cannever cover the variety of changes that are taking place; butas far as secondary schooling concerned the emergence of lessdifferentiated systems is the salient trend.

Differentiation in secondary schooling and highereducation should be considered on two separate levels: thestructure of the system external to individual institutionsand the internal structure of the institutions. Traditionallysecondary school systems have evolved a parallel system ofsecondary schools: academic (gymnasium, lycee, grammar schools),general education (hauptschule, CEG, secondary modern) andvocational (berufsschule, CET, technical) differing in theircurriculum, age of leaving, and relationships both withhigher education and the labour market. Frequently thesedifferent types of secondary schools were staffed with teacherstrained in different institutions, their curricula weremarkedly different, as was their relative prestige. In thiscontext the most striking immediate innovation has been thedevelopment of comprehensive secondary school structures: a-3chool system which joined under one roof the variety of typesof schools traditionally kept physically separated. Forlower secondary schooling this is a dominant tendency, althoughit is less strong in upper secondary education. Not allsecondary systems have introduced comprehensive structures,but those that have not have attempted to prevent restrictiveeducational practices stemming from early differentiationinto several types of selective schooling by innovation inthe secondary curriculum. This is the emergence of widercommon areas in what is being taught in a structurallydifferentiated secondary system. The aim is to enable pupilsto transfer between types of secondary school later than thenormal age of entry to these systems. Differentiated selectionwill not be irreversible, because of a common curriculum.This point is also important in systems that have introduced

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comprehensive external structures; some of these have alsosought to prevent internal differentiation into watertightstreams by introducing a common secondary school programmeto be followed by all pupils until aged 14-16.

Wider participation and widening of opportunitieshave also brought about (and in turn have been brought aboutby) changes in the structure and content of higher educationalsystems. The evolution towards a "mass" system of highereducation has taken place, and has created tensions in theexisting system. However, these have been resolved indifferent ways to the innovation in the secondary schoolsystem. The traditional pre-eminence of the university inthe third tier of education - and in many systems theuniversity is not merely pre-eminent it is the only facilityon this level - has not generally been changed by incorporatingother types of higher education into it. If anything thereverse seems to be the current trend: the emergence ofincreased variety ia types of institutions in higher education.In part this is, perhaps, because of the university system'sreluctance to modify, itself to meet the changed and changingneeds of students and society alike, but no less importantare fears about the length, expense and suitability ofuniversity types of studies for new types of students; hence,in many countries the emergence of new types of third-tierinstitutions, or the elevation 'df a variety 'f facilitiesnot traditionally considered on the same level as universities.What the 1970's may see is a parallel pattern of highereducation, analogous to its recent counterpart in secondaryeducation. Whether it will be forced by economic need,political action, or social and educational pressures, tounite into comprehensive or common facilities, as manysecondary school systems have, is a policy question for thenext generation of educational administrators.

Change has not only been in external structures andinternal curriculum, the actual nature of the teachingsituation (especially in secondary schools) and methods ofboth teaching and assesementhavebeen subject to significantchanges, The pressure for these has been from variousdirections: student demands for more relevant curricula,pedagogic pressures to change the nature of educationalobjectives from a content orientation towards an approachthat stresses ways of looking at problems and issues; and, ireturn, new curriculum and new teaching methods require newmethods of pupil-student assessment. As the nature of theeducational experience has changed (what is being taught,how and to whom) so must the criteria and methods ofeducational assessment. This change is limited only by theperhaps desirable conservatism of the system, and the short-run restraint of lack of finances and the long-run possibilityof limited pupil-student capacity and motivation,

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The growing size of educational enrolments a.:,d thescale and costs of the system have generated another problem:that of controlling the system. This is partly a "financial"problem of controlling expenditure, and especially controllingrates of increase in expenditure. In addition, the size ofindividual; educational institutions has increased and so hasthe complexity of the teaching-learning situation. This hasmeant that the administration of individual schools and collegeshas become an increasingly complex, skilled and specialistactivity. Of particular significance has been the problemof the types of skills and training required to administerlarge institutions, with highly differentiated curricula andvaried types of individualised educational programmes. Thisproblem has not been eased by recurrent and growing demandsfrom junior members of academic staffs and the student bodyfor wider participation and involvement in the decision-makingprocedures of institutions. All of these pressures hand ledto a re-thinking of the "role" of the teacher whose centralactivity is changing from being the information transmitter,to being a manager and manipulator of a multi-resource situation.

Perhaps the most critical question still unansweredafter recent experiences is the role education has in thesocial system. One aspect of this is particularly significantin the current debate: the extent to which the education systemis an independent factor in social change. How far it cangenerate the force(s) for economic development is one generalquestion, as is the extent to which it can be an instrumentof social justice (i.e. a means of alleviating and circumventinginequalities that stem from other institutions in society).Related to this discussion is the role education has for theindividual (is it essentially a preparation for work or forcitizenship?) ,and the extent to which it is a phase in life(full-time, compulsory schooling terminating in late adolescenceand early adulthood) or an experience that recurs throughoutlife, i.e. permanent education. It is this question ofpermanent education, for economic as much as socio-politicalreasons, that is likely to be a crucial area for futureeducational policy discussions.

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CHANGES IN SECONDARY AND HIGHER EDUCTION

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I : Introduction

CHAPTER II : Factors Explaining these Trends

(1) Growing Wealth

(2) Levels of Skill Socially-Economically Necessary

(3) Opportunity-EfficiencyArgument

(4) The Explosion in Knowledge

(5) The Impact of ExternalPressures

page 1

page 3

page 3

page 4

page 5

page 5

page 7

CHAPTER III : The Internal Pressures within theSystem page 10

(1) The Numbers page 10(2) The Impact of Changes in

Teaching Methods page 12(a) Methods of

Assessment page 13(b) The new teaching

situation page 14

CHAPTER IV : Structural Differentiation ofSecondary and Higher Education page 17

(1) Differentiation betweenInstitutions of Secondaryand Higher Education page 17

(2) Structural Differentiationwithin Institutions ofSecondary and HigherEducation page 22

CHAPTER V : Control over the System page 30

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CHAPTER VI : Role of Educational andSocial Change page 33

(a) The Limited Role Educationcan Play in Macro-socialChange page 37

(b) Factors Limiting ItheCapacity of Education toAchieve Change page 38

(c) Education for Production-Consumption / page 40

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CHANGES IN SECONDARY AND HIGHER EDUCpION

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1. It is best if the quasi-empirical assumptions of thispaper are made explicit at the outset: three broad types ofempirical trends can be detected and have been detailed inother Background Studies prepared for this Conference:

(a) Prolonged secondary education has become theexperience of a growing minority of the populationand will become part of the education of thesubstantial majority of the relevant age groupduring the next quarter of a century.

(b) With growing numbers successfully completingsecondary education, so the proportion of the agegroup entering some form of higher education hasincreased and will increase. In fact, it isprobably no exaggeration to say that in manycountries by the 1980's the percentage of the agegroup entering higher education will be as high,if not higher than the percentage entering academicsecondary education in the early 1950's.

(c) As the proportion entering and completing highereducation increases, so the numbers undertakingstudies at an "advanced" level (i.e. graduateschool) will increase. A somewhat similar tendencyis likely, as was noted under point (b) above - thepercentage of the age group entering graduate schoolby the and of this century may well be as high asthe percentage who entered undergraduate studiesone or two educational generations earlier.

2. These are the main empirical trends in educationalenrolments, and they have been amply illustrated and documented.The point can be extended by looking at a few isolatedexamples: in England and Wales the anticipated percentage ofthe age group entering higher education in the 1980's (Robbinsestimates) is roughly the same as the percentage who enteredselective secondary schools (grammar schools) thirty yearsearlier. Further, in the six years since the publication ofthe Robbins report, the percentage of secondary school pupilsobtaining minimum entry qualifications for higher educationhas increased at a faster rate than anticipated. As a result,although the numbers of places being provided in the varioustypes of higher education is in excess of Robbins recommend-ations, at least as far as universities are concerned transitionrates of suitably qualified applicants are declining.

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3. As a result of the combined force of increases in thesize of the age group and increases in enrolment ratios, thenumbers of people obtaining the baccalaur6at increased fromnearly 63,000 to over 100,000 between 1962 and 1966 in France.The VIth Plan anticipates that numbers will continue toincrease into the 1970's. A similar story can be told forSweden, between 1950 and 1959, the percentage of the relevantage group obtaining the student-examination increased from 8%to 14%. Parallel with this, the numbers entering highereducation also increased by similar amounts. Already inSweden roughly one-third of the age group (16 and 17 year olds)are entering the gymnasiums and nearly 3 out of 4 are receivingsome sort of voluntary post nine-year education. The same trendis discernable in economically less-developed parts of WesternEurope. In Austria the percentage of the age group in thefinal year of general secondary schools increased from 3% to8% between 1956 and 19669. further the Austrian authoritiesanticipate that, by 1975, 14510 of the age group will be completingacademic secondary schooling and most of them entering highereducation. It is worth noting that in the mid 1950's thenumber of graduates from the general secondary schools was3,259, in the mid 1960's it had doubled to 7,380 and by themid 1970's it will probably be over 11,000.

4. All these examples make the points suggested by the threeassumptions asserted at the outset. But it is possible to give Evcactual example of the probable nature of educational enrolmentin Western European countries over the next generation. Theactual situation in the U.S. at the moment reflects theeducational profile implied in points (a), (b) and (c) above,with the entire age group enrolled to mid-adolescence, withroughly 2 out of 3 graduating from secondary schooling and withmore than half of these (35% of the age group) entering highereducation and 25% of the age group completing their under-graduate studies successfully. Current U.S. estimates suggestthat half university graduates continue their studies into someform of further studies or graduate schools (i.e. entering afifth year of higher education). It is anticipated that theAmerican experience of the past twenty years will be that ofEurope during the next two decades. What it means is thatinstead of the majority of the age group finishing theireducation aged 13-15, the age of completion will be postponedfor 2 or 3 years as a result of increase in the length ofcompulsory schooling and, even more important, increasingvoluntary enrolments. Further, the proportions of the agegroup staying on and completing later stages of upper secondaryand higher education will increase. The change will not onlybe a postponement of the age of completing schooling. but,equally important, a ohnnged proportion receiving higher levelsof education.

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CHAPTER II

FACTORS EXPLAINING THESE TRENDS

5. Before discussing the implications of these increasesin enrolments, it is worth noting the various general factorswhich have been used to explain them. The phrase "used toexplain" has been utilised deliberately. The demonstrationof educational growth is straightforward, scientificallyexplaining that growth is by no means simple. What can bedone is to list certain general factors which common senseand observation suggest are related to educational expansion;but the actual mechanisms (social, economic, psychological)which relate these factors to the decision to stay on or dropout of school have not been adequately analysed. Nor in thepresent state of social sciences is it possible to weight thesefactors and detail their relative importance to the totalincrease - past and future - in enrolments. Educationalanalysis is by no means unique in this respect: demographerscan detail changes in populations, they can outline generalcauses for these changes, but they can neither spell out therelationship between cause and effect nor weight the causativefactors. Students of the educational system are in a roughlysimilar position to the demographers.

6. Four general influences probably' explain the increasein educational enrolments, and are likely to bring about furtherincreases over the next three decades:

(1) Growing Wealth

7. Although resource restraints may be treated as possibleinhibitants of future educational growth, currently increasein wealth is a .)otent factor determining educational expansion.Perhaps the clearest illustration of this is the increase ingross national income and per capita income experienced byOECD countries since the and of the second world war; ratesof growth differ but all countries have experienced profoundincreases in both their G.N.P. and per capita incomes. Formany countries the quarter of a century since the end of thewar has been the period of fastest economic development.Public affluence has at least generated the capacity foricreased (and increasing) expenditure in education. However,the statistical correlation between economic development andchange and educational expansion is by no means straightforward.Relatively underdeveloped countries have similar rates ofexpansion in higher education to those of highly developedcountries. But "wealth" must be considered on a second level,not merely the general well-being of the community but theindividual standards of living of the population. Somethingmust mediate between general wealth and tendencies for moreyoung people to stay on at school. One factor is private

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affluence: traditionally, people with particular levels ofincome seek for their children particular levels or typesof education. What we have seen over the past decades isan increase in the numbers of people with these levels ofincome, hence an increase in educational enrolments. Thisseems both naive and a statement of the obvious, neverthelessit may well be the most potent explanation of past and futureexpansion in enrolments. In fact, there has been a revolutionin educational aspirations and expectations in many sectors ofthe population. Amongst traditionally affluent sections ofthe community prolonged education of their children wasprobably seen as a consumption good, a way of denonstratingtheir wealth, and a social convention; with the increasinglyclose relationship developing between educational experienceand job opportunity, what was socially desirable as a signof privilege became necessary as a means of maintainingprivilege. For other sectors of the community, education wasa way out of a situation of socio-economic disadvantage, withincreasing affluence and extension of facilities it became ameans that in practice could be used.

(2) Levels of Sical Socially-EconomicallyNecessary

8. Increased public wil.nith created the possibility ofgreater expenditure in education. Politically what turneda possibility into a reality was the realisation that theincreased complexity (both economically and socially) ofindustrial society generated the need for higher levels ofeducation ibr both its citizens and its labour force. Apremium has been placed upon literacy as a means of socialsurvival in a society in which the means of communicationhave become increasingly the written word, and in which thecapacity to read and write are a pre-requisite for minimallevels of socio-political participation. Allied to this,the shift in the nature of the productive process away fromprimary production (agriculture, mines, lumbering, etc.),through secondary (manufacturing), to tertiary (serviceactivities), combined with an increase in the proportion ofthe labour force that is highly skilled (the professional-managerial cadres) has meant that education has becomeincreasingly important as a means of directly or indirectlypreparing individuals for work.

9. To some extent point (1) has been given the name socialdemand and point (2) manpower demand which have been conadeFid67975aors influencing educational participation rates, andmore particularly as a means of anticipating future enrolments.Although, for the purpose of analysis, these two should bekept separate, they are in fact inter- related and inter-act.Clearly the educational aspirations that individuals haveare not unrelated to the employment possibilities a particulareducation opens up. Equally significant, the educationalrequirements of a particular type of employment are a functionboth of the technical requirements of the job and the

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particular levels of education from which suitably qualifiedpeople can be recruited. As levels of educationalparticipation increase, so do the entry requirements ofparticular levels of employment. There is, therefore, adynamic relationship between labour market and social demand -each affects the other. Over time, educational part icipationhas increased, is increasing and will increase, because of thegrowing influence of both forces.

(3) 0 ortvnitv-nent10. A further political stimulus to structural reform andeducational expansion has come from the use of the educationalsystem as a means of social engineering. Again there aretwo inter- related arguments:

(a) In essentially inegalitarian societies - and industrialsocieties merely differ in the degree to which theyare inegalitarian - inequalities can only be justifiedinsofar as rewards, especially income differences,are closely related to the socio-economic significanceof position, and insofar as there is freedom ofmovement between positions. This is the "careersopen to talent" argument;

(b) In complex industrial societies certain technocraticpositions require highly trained people, but fewpeople have the natural talents either to benefitfully from the training or to function effectively inthe position. This is a "scarcity of talent"argument.

11. Social justice demands open access to positions ofprivilege and prestige; social efficiency demands therecruitment of the talented (from whatever origin) to thesepositions. The former is the argument of equity, the latterof necessity: both give a crucial role to education as a meansof simultaneously training, opening careers to talent, andrecruiting scarce talent from all sections of society. Thepurpose at the moment is not to re-affirm these arguments orthe feasibility of education as a means of realising theobjectives; it is to state that politically both the argumentsend the role of education outlined above have been accepted;fUrther, that their acceptance is one of the factors behindthe increased willingness on the part of the governments tospend money on education.

(4) The Explosion in Knowledge

12. A further general factor behind both past and futureexpansion in educational enrolments is the explosion inknowledge. This can be put very simply: if in the past ittook us hours (or days, weeks, months, years) to transmit ap:Iviiilminx skill. or tal eat, it may now take much longer,

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simply because of the increases in the amount of informationto be absorbed end techniques learnt. The level of educationto which this point is particularly pertinent is obviouslyhigher ed,.%.caticn, because it is in the realms of highly skilledmanpower (doctors, engineers, professional scientist, etc.)that the explosion in knowledge has been greatest. Illustra-tions of this explosion abound - the increase in the number ofbooks published each year, and the volume of scientific andmedical research completed since the war are obvious ,examples.The implication of the point is that education is beingprolonged not merely in the sense that more are being educated,but in a further sense that the acquisition of sufficientknowledge to become professionally competent in certain cadresof employment takes longer. Hence the upgrading of educationalqualifications demanded by certain types and levels of employmentand, equally important, the shift in what is being taught andin teaching methods to meet the changed and changing "knowledgesituation".

13. These four factors have separately and togethergenerated the need, the means and the impetus for educationalexpansion. Further, they are the forces that will stimulateexpansion over the next decades. They do not exhaust theinfluences upon the system: for example demographic factors- which had a considerable influence on enrolments in thefifties and sixties - have been ignored. On top of this,the educational system itself is a potent pressure for..expansion in at least three senses:

(a) Like other parts of the social system it has its ownmeans of mobilising expansion, through semi-politicalpressure via teachers unions, political parties, andeducational writing, to encourage wider participationand greater educational expenditure both as an end initself (education as a good) and as an instrument forother social-political-economic objectives. Here thes stem attem ts to enerate a demand for itself bactivity ou si.e e e ucationa mst em.

(b) The system has, to no small extent, control over itsown "demand" through its control over its directconsumers% the pupils and students. It (andparticularly the teachers) can seek to motivate themto stay on at school, and participate longer in thesystem. Here the system creates its own demand,by encouraging consumers To remain within the system.

(c) But9 the educational system does not merely trainpeople for other parts of the socio-economic system,it is one of the greatest consumers of its own highly-trained manpower, i.e. the teaching profession. Anentire level of higher education (teacher training)is concerned with the preparation of the professionand, in addition, traditionally one of the greatest

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sources of employment for university graduates was withinthe educational system. This, then, is a system thatconsumes itself; in the shortrun a relatively smallincrease in general educational enrolments can mean aconsiderable increase in he demand for places in highereducation. Here the system consumes its own products.

(5) The Impact of External Pressures

14. These are the four pressures "external" to theeducational system, creating forces to which the system mustrespond. They are organic pressures on the system in thesense that all levels and types of education experience themand have to adjust to them. To take an extreme example,although the impact of the "knowledge explosion" is easier toillustrate, and perhaps more significant on the levels ofhigher education, its influence can be seen in other levels ofeducation. The curriculum in the later stage of academicsecondary education has had to be both adjusted and expanded totake into account changes in the nature of the demand forhigher education. Even in primary levels of education, theexpansion in knowledge and, more important, the change inattitudes towards knowledge (especially a critical uncertaintyabout what is known) is influencing both what is taught and how.The effort to introduce the "scientific attitude" (in contrastto the content of science) in innovatory programmes in schoolscience provides one set of examples, as do the variousinnovations in mathbmatics teaching in many countries.

15. But this is not to say that all levels and types ofeducation are equally vulnerable to the pressures generatedby these macro forces. Differences exist both between levelsof education (primary, secondary, higher) and types ofeducation (academic, vocational,technical, general) in theintensity with which they are felt. An obvious example ofthis is the demand from the labour market for trained manpower.The direct influence of this pressure is far greater on thehigher or secondary levels of education than it is on theprimary. In the latter, the main emphasis is on a commongeneral schooling, justified on a multiplicity of social andeducational grounds. A stronger case can be made out forsystems of higher and even upper secondary education to bemore responsive to vocational opportunities in determiningwhat is taught and how. Similarly the intensity of thelabour market forces is more directly felt in certain faculties.An obvious case in point is the difference between subjectswhich are related to job preparation, such as medical studiesor engineering in higher education, and various types ofvocational programmes in secondary education; and thosesubjects which are of less direct application to the worksituation, for example many classical and languages programmesin secondary schools, andlto a lesser extent, natural scienceprogrammes. Amongst the former the vocationalcontent is high, and the pressure of labour market needsin determining how many are educated and what type of

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education they receive is considerable. By contrast, thedirect influence on labour market needs on the teaching ofclassics or languages is small, but not necessarily insignifi-cant. For example, the relative popularity of subjectsselected by students may in part be influenced by their careeropportunities and aspiration. In other words, by theirperception of labour market possibilities. What this argumentsuggests is that it is the INTENSITY of these pressures thatdiffers,not their existence.

16. Despite this observation,two broad generalisationscan be made about changes in these pressures over the past10-20 years, and their likely continuation with increases inenrolment over the next quarter of a century:

(a) A decline in the total impact of economic factors andinfluences on who shall be educated (i.e: how manypupil students there are), and a commensurate increasein the intensity of socio-political factors indetermining the number educated, at what level and,probably, receiving what types of education. Withincreasing wealth (both personal increases and nationalincome) the resource restraints limiting educationalopportunity are being gradually reduced, first of allin lower secondary schooling, and more recently insecondary and higher education. Hopefully by theend of the century these will have been virtuallyeliminated throughout education by a mixture ofeconomic growth and the greater priority given toeducation within society as a result of risingaspirations. This will mean that the influence ofsocio-political factors on who shall be educated maywell dominate even higher eliAEation by the end ofthe 20th Century.

(b) A decline is anticipated in the significance ofdiscussions about the content of education (what istaught and what is learn and an increase in theimportance of how a subject is taught. This islargely the result of what was briefly mentionedearlier on the knowledge explosion, which will mean -particularly in highly technical subjects andspecialised fields - what is learnt will be quicklyoutdated by further research. Hence the emphasisupon methods of obtaining knowledge and approachestowards a subject.or subject area. Allied to thisis the increased interest, especially in higher education,of breaking down subject specialisation and introducingstudents to broad areas of study and enquiry. Thisparticular process is an attempt to break down thebarriers between disciplines (between economics andsociology and psychology, or mathematics and physics,chemistry and the biological science) and between broadareas of study (natural sciences compared with thesocial science).

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17. Both of these generalisations have a point of contact:namely, one of the factors influencing labour market require-ments has been the demand from employers for secondary schooland university graduates with a general training and educationthat can be applied in the work situation rather than aspecific discipline or technical skill that can be transferredto it. This point is of particular significance when it isremembered that with the expansion of enrolments the types ofwork that secondary and higher education graduates will enterwill not be those which traditionally they would have enteredfrom this level of education. Again American experience isillustrative: many levels of employment (both skilled manualand routine non-manual) require as a condition of entry ahigh school graduation diploma. Other grades of non-manualwork (bank employees, policemen, lower level management etc.)require several years college or college graduation. Suchrequirements, although unthinkable in Western Europe in thefifties and sixties, may not be by 1980's or 1990's. Insofaras prolonged education prepares these people for their worksituation, it is not by either vocational training or by anintellectual training wilYhasising either subject matter or aparticular discipline. What is required is a peri:5,1 ofprolonged general education that enables individuals both torealise and discipline their talents.

18. One point must not be lost sight of in this discussion:although the general force of economic factors may diminish,they cannot be eliminated. In particular, certain areas ofeducation will always have a considerable vocational content(mentioned earlier were the medical sciences, engineering andtechnology). Here the impact of labour market requirementswill operate on two levels:

(a) Determining the contents of the course ofinstruction: occupational life will involveapplying what is learnt to specific situations.Therefore the content of the course (both inthe sense of what is learnt and the methods andprinciples of enquiry) will be of considerablesignificance and, given the knowledge explosion,require regular up-dating.

(b) Determining the number being educated: if toomany (or too fewrataents follow these specialistfields then there will be either a surplus ofindividuals with specialist skills that can onlybe absorbed by the labour market at levels ofoccupation lower than individual aspirationsvora deficit with consequent scarcity of trainedmanpower. Given the point that these types ofeducation are prolonged and costly, a surnlus oftrained manpower would be a waste of human andeconomic resources and may well be frustratingfor the individuals concerned. On the other

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hand, a deficit may be difficult to reducequickly, with resulting economic and socialinefficiencies.

19. Therefore, in these fields manpower requirements willcontinue to be a salient influence on the number receivingthis type of education. These then are exceptions to thefirst general proposition suggested above: manpower forcesstill directly determine much of the content of the educationand the numbers receiving it in their fields. But the pointmust be made that these are only a minority of the subjectscovered by a system of secondary-higher education, andtherefore the general proposition remains.

CHAPTER III

THE INTERNAL PRESSURES WITHIN THE SYSTEM

(1) The Numbers

20. The argument above suggests that the educational systemcan be treated as an organism made up of inter-related parts,responding to a common set of external pressures of differingintensities according to levels and type of education. Butthe system is not merely inter-related, it is also inter-dependent. Each level is dependent, in part, on what hasgene before; each subject - both how it is taught and what -in principle affects the ways in which other subjects aretaught. Because of this, changes at one stage or level ofeducation require adjustments and modifications at otherstages or levels. Modifications of the structure, curriculumor teaching methods at one level of education can bring aboutthe need for reform, or at least adjustment, at other levels.

21. Perhaps the most striking example of this point is theway in which the growth of pupil numbers through one level ofthe system brings with it the need for expansion at the next.Clearly, the demand for expansion of higher educationalinstitutions in response to the growth in numbers of graduatesfrom upper secondary education is a case in point. No systemin Western Europe has been left untouched by these quantitativepressures. But simply to suggest that growth at one leveldemands growth at others is to oversimplify both the policyalternatives and the possible short-run restrictions of lackof facilities and finance.

22. One example of such alternatives and restrictions isprovided by Sweden. The reform of lower secondary schooling(the 9-year comprehensive system) was both a change in thestructure of the schooling (a common school) and a profound

change in the nature of the curriculum. An especiallyimportant part of the latter was the objective of encouragingflexibility in the choice of subjects and enabling transferbetween specialisations. Specialisation was to be postponedby leaving options open. Further, initial choice of subjectswas left to the decision of the pupil and his parent, althougheffective performance through the "system" was a limitingfactor. This role of parental-pupil choice was consideredcrucial, and was to be continued into the transition to uppersecondary schooling (gymnasium, fackskola and continuationschools). The decision not only about staying on at schoolbut about the type of course to be followed, was to be leftsubstantially to the decision of the pupil, supported byparents and advised by the teaching profession. The resultwas a large majority of the population in 8th and 9th gradesopting for courses that gave the right of entry to thegymnasium (i.e. continued academic study, traditionally leadingto the university) and an over-subscription at the end of the9th grade for these courses.

23. One solution might have been simply to expand thegymnasium structure to absorb the growing numbers of mid-adolescents wanting entry. Certainly, in Sweden considerableexpansion took place in gymnasium entry; and further academicstudies could be taken outside the gymnasium in other typesof upper secondary education - the fackskola and continuationschools - which could be followed by later transfer to thegymnasium. However, in the mid-sixties a policy was introducedtemporarily fixing the proportion of the age group enteringthe gymnasium at Y3 of the age group. This was justifiedlargely on the grounds of the demand from the labour market forthis type of training, but the resource difficulty of quicklyexpanding the numbers of gymnasia also played its part. Thisis an alternative solution to general expansion, by fixing alimit on the size of the entry group and thereby re-introducingselection for upper education; opportunity is limited byplaces available, and the number of places provided is justifiedin terms of likely employment opportunities for the graduatesfrom the system and available educational resources.

24. The transition from secondary to higher educationprovides a further example of the same situation. Rapidexpansion, both actual and anticipated, in the number of peoplequalified for entry to higher education has brought aboutdiscussions in many systems that have traditionally had "opendoor" policies to higher education (i.e. all secondary schoolgraduates who wish to enter may enter). There has been publicdiscussion in France, Germany and Sweden about the necessity(on resource grounds) and desirability (on grounds of quality)of restricting entry to higher education in general, theuniversities in particular, or in certain faculties. It isimportant to keep distinct the different reasons for introducingvarious entry restrictions. Some relate to the impossibilityof expanding higher educational institutions any further, or

STP(70)11 - 12 -

fast enough, either on grounds of lack of resources or becausesuch expansion would bring about a deterioration in theeducation being offered. A further argument stresses theway in which expansion of lower and upper secondary educationhas resulted'in a deterioration in the quality of entrants tohigher education. This has been called the "more will meanworse" thesis. In addition, the long-range possibility oflarge numbers of higher education graduates being absorbed bythe labour market has also been questioned. All of these havebeen used as argwnents to limit entry to university, and tochange the open door policy.

25. It is worth noting that,in certain respects, thispolicy has already been modified: in France and Sweden, forexample, entry to certain faculties (medicine in both cases,but also certain types of engineering, and in some casesphysical sciences) is restricted to secondary school graduatesin certain appropriate lines; and in Sweden selection ispartly based upon performance. A similarA3erformance proposalwas discussed in France, as was a more general set ofrestrictions on entry. The fact that they have been turneddown should not result in our ignoring the initial reason forsuggesting them, nor in our assuming that as the pressure ofnumbers from below increases in the future similar suggestionswill not be made again. In fact, similar restrictions tothose in Germany already exist in France. Also, in thiscontext it must be remembered that the U.S. system (which,it was suggested earlier, might provide an illustration forexpanding European systems) does have limited right of entryto certain types or levels of higher education. The existenceof private, selective institutions is one example; restrictionof right of entry to state universities to high school graduateswith a particular average grade point (based upon rank positionor grade average) is another; finally, the existence of adifferentiated state system of higher education (juniorcolleges, state colleges, state universities), frequently withdifferent entry conditions, is a means of restricting entrynot to higher education but to individual institutions andto types and levels of institutions. On top of this, a highrate of failure, especially in the first year of university,can be seen as a means of effectively controlling the absolutenumber of students (in some colleges as many as 500 of entrantsdrop out during the course). "Control" on student numbers isachieved by higher attrition rates, and expenditure is partiallylimited by a differentiated system of higher education.

(2) The Impact of Changes in Teaching Methods

26. Although expansion in numbers is perhaps the mostdramatic change that has taken place in both secondary andhigher education, of considerable significance are a seriesof pieces of structural changes (i.e. the relationship betweentypes of educational facilities) and modification of thecurricula, both in terms of content and method. In their own

- 13 - STP(70)11

way, these have brought about the need for adaptation ofother aspects of the system. Two such adaptations are ofimmediate significance: the methods of assessment beingused, and the new types or styles of teaching situation.

(a) Methods of assessment

27. In a sense this is a similar problem to the criteriaused for entry, discussed above; but in this context itrelates to the way changes in what is taught and how have madetraditional methods of assessment inadequate. Reforms inlower secondary schooling are a case in point. These havegenerated, and are generating, three types of examination-assessment problem:

(i) The numerical. A system of examination thathas evolvia to assess a small minority of thepopulation (national examinations using nationalexaminers, both marking papers and interviewingcandidates) is impractical when, instead of 5% of theage group, 25% or more may be submitting themselvesfor the terminal upper secondary examination and theentire age group for their lower secondary counter-parts. In principle, the same point exists inhigher education although the numbers involved aresmaller. Sheer numbers may, on practical grounds,generate the need for change in the format of assess-ment.

(ii) Educational objectives. Traditional examin-ations (either written or oral) are seen to beinconsistent with some of the objectives of a reformedsystem of education. For some, the emphasis onassessment at one point in time is wrong; continuousassessment of the individual throughout his course,covering all facets of the work, is considered to beeducationally more desirable. On top of this, thenature of traditional examinations tended to emphasisethe content of a course and encourage memorisation ofcourse con This is seen to be incompatiblewith a system that seeks to encourage intellectualindependence, self-directed enquiry, and a criticalapproach to a subject rather than the capacity tolearn by heart. A less central example are theparticular reforms of content in certain subjects -for example, new mathematics and science courses -which obviously cannot be assessed by examinationsgeared towards the traditional curricula. This ispartly a question of new course content (what is beingtaught). But more important are the objectives.New science courses emphasise experimentation andpersonal investigation rather than second-hand contactmerely using a textbook as demonstration. Theconstant plea from student activity for more "relevant"curricula is a further example.

(iii) Assessment of the "new" type of pupilstudent.Related to the above, is a third and more contentious

problem: traditional methods of assessment have beendeveloped not only to examine a few pupils who wereessentially elitist (it was at least assumed that theywere the intellectual elite) but these methods werealso part of the literary humanitarian tradition in,for instance, their emphasis upon the written word.

It is questionable whether such methods are appropriatefor a mass system of education, both higher andsecandary; and for a system in which a substantialpart of the instruction either does not or will notemphasise the written word, or at least not in

traditional book form for example, computerassistedlearning, programmed learning, language laboratories,educational television. Such techniques do not makethe literal-sr culture obsolete. They simply mean thatthe literary culture is only part of the total cultureto which an individual is exposed. Future methods ofassessment must have some relationship to the type ofinstructional techniques utilised. Finally, iftraditional examination systems are appropriate forthe "intellectually able",what happens in a system thatis attempting to encompass and educate all levels andtypes of abilities? The system of assessment usedmust bear some relationship to the capacities of thepupils being assessed.

Frequently these factors interact with eachother and/Or point in the same policy direction asfar as evaluation methods are concerned. The problemencapsulated under the "new" pupils, and practicalproblems of numerical expansion, are two ways oflooking at the same set of problems. Further,modification of educational objectives is partly theresult of and also a means of encouraging thenumerical expansion and, therefore, the educationalinvolvement of the new pupil.

(b) The new teaching situation

28. The basic change that is likely t) occur in. secondaryschooling over the next quarter of a century has only beentouched upon above. Although; related to the expansion innumbers, it is not dependent I:von it because it can be justifiedon purely educational grounds,. Much of it is already partof primary school educational practice in some countries, and

is becoming part of lower secondary. Its extension intoupper secondary is basical11, the result of its educationalmerit, but is in part a consequence of upper secondary schoolshaving to meet the needs of pupils whose Sarlier educationhas fundamentally changed. In essence, the revolution is inthe role of the teacher and the relationship between pupil andteacher. It is tempting 6o see these changes in terms of a

20.

- 15 - STP(70)11

new educational technology, but this is to compare the artifactwith the reality. Three basic changes are likely in theteacher role and in the teacher situation. The complexeducational technology is best seen both as a means of achievingthese changes and as a spur to them.

(i) The concept of the "class". In primary schools,children of mixed abilities have been taught together;although "streaming" may be adopted as a means ofdifferentiation in a common school situation. Suchclasses are likely to continue through lower secondaryschooling and ultimately, perhaps, into upper secondaryschooling. The reasons for this are both practicaland theoretical: practical because the entire agegroup is continuing through the system, theoreticalbecause it is considered desirable that commonschooling (the opposite of differentiation-selection)should be prolonged. What this means is that insteadof differentiation between institution and subjects,any differentiation that takes place will be within theclassroom situation. This point will be discussedat length later, for the moment only one of itsimplications will be stressed, which is that thesecondary teacher will not be confronted with a classof 20 or 30 pupils but with a class divided into sub-groups (what has become known as "family groupings"),or a class made up of 20-30 individuals pursuing theirown studies at their own pace and direction (so-called"individualised" programmes).

(ii) The concept of the subject teacher. Traditionallyprimary schools have been class based, with a classteacher covering all or most subjects. By contrast,academic secondary schooling has been subject based,with each subject(s) having a teacher, but pupilsrotating between teachers. For a variety of reasonsthe primary practice is being, and will continue to be,extended into secondary schooling. Again, there aremixtures of practical and theoretical reasons forthis. The shortage of specialist teachers - especiallyin fields like mathematics, the sciences, and to someextent foreign languages - in a system in which theentry age group is being exposed to specialistsubjects, is an example of a practical factor. Alliedto this is the shift away from the idea of "subjects"(e.g. languages, geography, history, literature)towards an "area" of concern or interest. In part,such concerns are the result of fears of early subjectspecialisation and consequent narrowness of attitudein education. In part it'is the result of theknowledge explosion mentioned earlier: that detailedand subject content are less important than the mannerin which knowledge is acquired and problems approached.There are pedagogical reasons which point in the same

21

STP(70)11 - 16 -

direction as the practical one, towards "theme"teaching and area studies. It would be wrong to givethe impression that such pressures are .only found inlower secondary schools; the curricula of .many ofthe new institutions of higher education (Sussex inthe U.K., Konstanz in Germany) have in part beenbreaking down narrow specialisation into broad areasof enquiry and interest.

(iii) The conce t of the timetable. The traditionalschool ay has' een roken own into a set of fairlyshort periods, their actual length varying with theage of the pupil etc. Such a system is incompatiblewith theme teaching, which does not lend itself toneat timetable packages. Nor does the idea of aclass sub-divided into groups or individualisedprogrammes fit into the traditional timetable situation.Therefore, several variants are already evolving: oneis the idea of the inte rated day, the other the ideaof team or co-operative eac in. The former relatesto tie way a day, week or term is planned; -the amountof time ceases to be the period, but a longer unit(i.e. a day, a week, a term). A programme is workedout for that time period; sometimes for individualpupils, sometimes groups within a class, sometimes aclass, sometimes classes together. Team teaching isa device which can make this possible, namely groupsof teachers joining together and planning jointly thecourse to be followed for several traditional classesof pupils. Such a technique is essential if areastudies at a sophisticated level are to be achievedand, further, if the specialist skills of teachersin short supply are to be available to a maximumnumber of pupils.

29. These three changes add up to a revolution in theinternal structuring of the school situation, and in therelationship between teacher and pupils. Added together,they mean that the notion of subject, class syllabus andteachers, undergoes considerable modification. The argumentis that, for a mixture of the practical and theoreticalreasons touched upon earlier, these changes will becomeincreasingly apparent throughout the secondary school system.It is within such a changed system that the role of complexeducational technology - especially educational televisionand computer-assisted learning - becomes significant. Thesegive the staff of schools the means of providing both thespecialist support (e.g. closed circuit T.V.) and theindividualised prognmmne (e.g. computer-assisted learning)that are some of the liew objectives of the educational system.

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CHAPTER IV

STRUCTURAL DIFF Di TIATION OF SECONDARY

AND HIGHER EDUCATION

30. A distinction has already been i;Iplied between thedifferentiations by type of institution, for example a parallelsystem of secondary education and the existence of a varietyof type of higher education institutions, and differentiationswithin an institution in terms, for instance, of the coursesor subjects being followed and between the abilities of pupilsand students within the institution.

(1) Differentiation between Institutions ofTgeondary and Higher Education

31. It is in the first of these levels that there isperhaps the greatest contrast in tendencies between higherand secondary education. Within secondary education there isa widespread movement away from systems of differentiationbetween institutions (the parallel system), towards commonor comprehensive school structures. By.contrast, withinhigher education a reverse tendency seems to be operatingtowards the creation of a more differentiated system of educationwith greater variety of type of institution. Neither of thesetrends is universal: in Austria, for example, there is currentlyno movement towards comprehensive schooling, rather parallelschools will continue but greater opportunity will be givenfor pupil transfer between school types, etc. In the U.K.there is pressure to bring a highly differentiated structureof higher education - with universities, colleges of education,colleges of technology, polytechnics, as well as a plethora ofinstitutions of further and higher education - into a lessdifferentiated binary system. And some argue in favour of aunitary system, the polyversities. For example, one of therecommeadations of the Robbins Committee was the developmentof a unitary system of administration of British highereducation. However, despite these examples, the tendency inmost countries seems to be towards the development ofundifferentiated secondary school systems and more differenti-ated higher eduodtional ones.

32. In Western Europe there is already considerableevidence to support the first of these propositions. InNorway and Sweden all schooling will be comprehensive up toand including the 9th grade (until age 16). Further, theSwedish authorities have incorporated the three types ofgymnasium (academic, technical, commercial) into a singlesystem, and they and the Norwegian authorities are discussingthe integration of the various types of upper secondary school

23

STP(70)11 - 18 -

(gymnasium, fackskola, continuation school, plus a varietyof types of vocational studies). Parts of both Germany andthe U,K. already have a comprehensive system, but in suchdecentralised systems of educational administration it isdifficult to generalise. However, in 1965 the U.K. Departmentof Education and Science instructed local authorities tosubmit plans for their reorganisation of secondary schoolinginto a comprehensive system. It is even possible thatlegislation will be forthcoming within the next 2 yearscompelling authorities to undertake such reorganisation. Thiswill not necessarily mean a uniform system of secondaryschooling throughout England and Wales, because the Departmentlisted four main varieties of comprehensive schools:

(a) For pupils aged 11-18 years, "all-incomprehensive", covering the whole ofsecondary schooling;

(b) For pupils aged 11-16 years, schools with6th form colleges - i.e. a split at theand of "ordinary" level and transfer to aspecialist institution for "advanced' levelwork (a 6th form college);

A two-tier system of schools for pupils aged11-14 years, with transfer to schoolspreparing for "0" and "A" level work (theLeicestershire system). Under such a systempupils who wished to continue at school afterthe end of the compulsory period (aged 15+)would move on to a further school;

(d) A system of middle schools which would continueupper primary and lower secondary educationwith transfer to all-age comprehensive schoolsat age 12 or 13.

(e)

These are not hypothetical examples but represent the varietyof type of structures that exist, not only in the U.K. butthroughout Western Europe. It is almost certainly betterto discuss comprehensive reorganisations of lower secondaryschool systems (e.g. the CEG in France, the "scucla media"in Italy and the 9-year common school in Sweden and Norway)quite separately from the upper secondary systems, and thetotally reorganised systems (e.g. the one model in Englandand Wales for pupils aged 11-18 years, and the U.S. highschool). There is, therefore, a strong trend discernablein Western Europe towards the elimination of parallel systems(e.g. the German Gymnasium, Haupt and Realschule, the FrenchLycee, CEG and CES, and the British grammar, secondary modernand secondary technical schools), towards a system where allcourses are offered within a single school type which allyoung people attend.

- 19 - STP(70)11

33. The reasons behind these trends are multiple, andcan be categorised under the two words used earlier: the

practical and theoretical. The practical argument stemsfrom the expansion in enrolments; if the age of compulsoryschooling is to be increased, and if voluntary staying onrates increase further, most countries have or will have themajority of their 16-18 year olds in school. Why, then, in

separate institutions? Allied to this is the pressure -both social and economic - for the educational experiencesof all adolescents to be the same for as long as possible.When pupils were leaving school at different ages and under-

taking different courses, parallel systems made some sense.Where this is no longer the situation, they make littleeducational sense. Allied to these practical points area series of theoretical ones, all of which are related to theobjectives of the system. Several are common to most systems -ensuring equality of opportunity, maximisation of theutilization of human talent, enabling all youngsters todevelop to the full their potentialities and capacities.These are objectives that most educational systems wouldapplaud. The theoretical argument is that they can only be

achieved in a common school system. Parallel systems implychoice and selection; if this is done early then talents

cannot be assessed and potentialities realised. Early select-ion becomes rigid selection if. it is followed - as it usually

has been - by qualitatively different educational experiences.

What secondary school reorganisation is trying to achieve isthe postponement of the time when such decisions have to bemade, ensuring that they do not result in di :ferent types of

education and so become virtually irreversible. It is forthese types of reasons that the introduction of common lower

secondary schooling has become more widespread in recent

years.

34. However, the tendency in higher education is thereverse: here, in many countries the pressure is to introducegreater differentiation into the system of higher education.This is taking a variety of forms, of which three are the

most significant:

(a) Special courses or cycles, usually of shorterduration, are created or developed within theuniversity leading to a terminal degreegenerally considered below the traditionaluniversity terminal degree level. These coursessometimes have a further characteristic of close

vocational relationships, especially whencompared with the traditional university course.Another development taking place withinuniversities concerns countries, and fields ofstudy, where in the past only one type of degreewas awarded after a relatively long period ofstudy. In these cases, two or three cycleswere created with a corresponding differentiationof degrees. Thus, for example, German speaking

:. 25

STP(70)11 - 20 -

universities in Switzerland, where so far theonly terminal degree has been the doctorate,have introduced the "licence" as a firstterminal degree. A similar differentiationhas been introduced in Austria and Germany("Magister") and is currently under discussionin Italy. In fact, this trend implies agreater differentiation between undergraduateand post-graduate studies.

(b) New institutions are created and developedoutside the existing universities. This is notthe creation of new universities, but of para-university level institutions in addition tothe traditional ones. A good example are theFrench "Instituts Universitaires de Technologie"(IUT), as well as the Norwegian "DistrictColleges". In the U.K. after the RobbinsReport, Colleges of Advanced Technology weretransformed into universities and, since thattime, polytechnics provide further examples ofeither the development or creation of new typesof higher education institutions. In thiscontext a distinction should be drawn betweenattempts to develop special and prestigefulinstitutions within a mass system (e.g. theCentre of Excellence) and attempts to achievea mass system by developing a level of highereducation carrying lower status than traditionaluniversities (for example, junior colleges inthe U.S. and new types of polytechnics in theU.K.).

(c) Institutions which in the past have operated ona secondary level were up-graded - or are beingupgraded - into institutions of higher education.One example stands out: the situation of teacher-training in most countries. Training of primaryschool teachers in particular was in manycountries a part of secondary schooling - infact the graduates of the system were sometimesconsidered the equivalent of secondary schoolgraduates for university entry purposes. Manysystems are now attempting to give teacher -training parity of prestige with higher educationand recruit into it graduates of the academicsecondary school system. The contrast with thetraditional status given to the graduate ofthe teacher-training institutions was roughlythe same as the graduate from academic secondaryschools. Again the motivation is multiple. Itis clearly a way of providing higher educationalfacilities for the swollen numbers of secondaryschool graduates; in turn, it may well be a wayof both raising the status of the teacher and

- 21 - STP(70)11

obtaining better-qualified entrants to thesystem of teacher-training. How far it will besuccessful in either of these points is a questionfor the future. Although teacher-trainingprovides the clearest examples, many specialistinstitutions concerned with professional training,especially of engineers and technologists, areexperiencing similar up-grading as a result ofpolitical decisions and economic pressures.

35. It must be admitted that these three broad types ofstrategies do not exhaust the possibilities and, more important,they tend to overlap. Perhaps the best illustration of this"blurring" is the American junior college system, which couldcertainly be considered as an example of the first two typesof strategy, and was also designed to achieve some of theobjectives of the third (i.e. give higher education to theincreased and increasing proportion of the age group, withoutimmediately expanding universities). In addition, it servesas something of a "cautionary tale". It is designed to givea shorter, non-university type of education, with possibilitiesfor some of its graduates to transfer to university. Andthere seems little doubt that a large proportion of entrantsdo aspire to higher education; but the drop-out rate in juniorcolleges is high - perhaps two-thirds of entrants; for halfthe remainder of entrants the education is terminal, and theother half enter universities. A further example of anoverlap is the "Open University' in the U.K. - a new institutionusing mass media methods of instruction has been developed tocater both for students of the traditional age group for entryto higher education and the older population who were deniedaccess to higher education during their late adolescence andearly adulthood.

36. It seems, therefore, that the general tendency istowards less differentiation between types of secondary schools,and more differentiation in the system of higher education.This apparently paradoxical situation can be resolved fairlysimply: both systems are responding to similar sorts ofpressures, but the initial systeJs were markedly different.The secondary school systems were highly differentiated withhigh status given to the academic schools - gymnasium, lycee,grammar school - both because of the characteristics of theirentrants (a mixture of intellectual and social elitism) andthe chances offered by this type of education (entry touniversities and occupations carrying relatively high prestigeand rewards). This parallel system was unable to withstandthe pressures of a movement towards mass involvement insecondary schooling, with a socio-political objective ofencouraging the involvement for economic (maximizing the useof talent) and social justice (equality of opportunity)reasons. The very nature of the differentiated system actedas a bottle-neck in mass involvement. By restricting rightof entry, and providing different types of courses, later

STP(7)11. -22-

re-entry to the "academic" line was difficult. Highereducation provides a contrasting example: the policy strategyto break the stranglehold of an elitist university system wasnot for universities to take over the system, but to createcounterveiling opportunities in parallel institutions. Avariety of justifications can be given for this alternativestrategy. Not least important are various resource arguments:in most countries university education is both lengthy - toobtain a degree may take 6-8 years and often much longer; thedrop-out rate is very high; and much of what is taught haslittle relevance to the employment situations graduates willenter. This contrasts markedly with the other institutions,the training in which is shorter, much more vocationallyoriented, and has a lower rate of attrition. Hence a strongcase can be made for expanding the parallel system - especiallywhen the newly created institutions are much more directlyunder the "control" of the sponsoring ministry.

37. There is, however, another likely influence: theinterest of universities is probably too great, and the forcesresistant to change too strong, for the system itself to betaken over and re-organised. Furthermore, the social pressuresfor the expansion and re-organisation of secondary educationare possibly far stronger at the moment than those for re-organising higher education. This may well be a contributoryfactor to the different policy strategy. But a question canbe asked: will similar pressures arise for the re-organisationof higher education to those that have arisen for secondary?Will the creation of parallel structures for the first yearsof higher education be a temporary expedient which renewedpressure of numbers in the 1970's and 1980's will findinadequate? In a sense, the types of pressures now bringingtogether parallel systems of secondary schooling, developedduring the 19th and early 20th century into "comprehensive"systems, may well be experienced by the parallel system ofhigher education evolving in many countries. Certainly onesystem which has a more highly developed parallel system ofhigher education - the U.K. - is already experiencing pressurestowards "comprehensivation" of structures.

(2) Structural Differentiation within Institutionsof Secondary and Higher Education

38. The second level on which differentiation can bediscussed is within particular institutions. This type ofdifferentiation is of two types, which in the real worldoverlap:

(a) differentiation by pupil's ability - i.e.streaming

(b) differentiation by course or lines taken - i.e.by subject .

Traditionally in selective secondary schooling there has beenan assumed correlation between the two (e.g. pupils taking the

001

- 23 - STP(70)11

academic lines were assumed to be intellectually the most able).But the two must be kept separate for the purposes of thecurrent discussion. The practical problem is most acutelyfelt in secondary schooling - namely, how far the problemsgenerated by a parallel system of schooling (i.e. differentiationbetween institutions) will be re-created within a comprehensivestructure by a system of differentiation within the school(according to pupil's abilities and/or subjects taken).

39. In view of the "theoretical" justifications given forthis type of re-organisation - for example, equality ofeducational opportunity and maximal utilization of talent -the question arises of how far these will be vitiated byparallel ability or subject streams within an institution.British experience with ability streaming in primary schoolsindicates how far it becomes an intellectually self-fulfillingsystem, and also how it is intimately connected with classorigin of pupils. The existence in the American high schoolsystem of academic courses (leading to university), andvocational courses (not usually leading to higher education),provides evidence both about how quickly subject differentiationbecomes associated with class and ethnic differences, and howhard this is to modify once established. Recent Swedishexperience is also relevant here: the re-organised 8th and 9thgradesof the comprehensive school were differentiated intonine courses, some theoreicall some practical. The decisionabout courses to be follc.-:iwT.s left to the pupil and hisparents. As was mentioned earlier, the majority chose .thetheoretical lines that led on to the gymnasium. In a societylike Sweden, given choice, people opt for the academic line,which is both status conferring and leaves all opportunitiesbroadly open. No doors are closed. Basically the Swedishcurriculum is evolving into a common academic type until atleast mid-adolescence.

40. This leads on to the basic question' how far canre-organisation and re-structuring go? American and Britishexperience suggests difficulties of reforming only part ofthe system, namely re-organising the external structure ofschools without changing the internal organisation of theschool. Simply having a common school may not achieve theobjective of wider and more equal educational participation;it may merely mean the re-introduction of all inequalitiesin a disguised form as a result of the system of internaldifferentiation of the curriculum. Swedish practice indicatesone possible consequence of genuine common schooling and theproblems it generates for the next stage of education, namelycan all the graduates from the re-structured stage - in bothexternal and internal senses - who wish to transfer to thenext stage be absorbed? In the Swedish case this involvestransfer to upper secondary, but the same point could bemade for higher education. Two types of restraints maylimit this:

STP(70)11 - 24 -

(a) Resource restraints. Have we the educationalresources, especially specialist manpower, toabsorb these numbers and provide them with alevel of education similar in quality to thetraditional provision?

(b) Intellectual restraint. Have the growingnumbers of applicants the intellectual abilityand motivation to benefit from the level ofeducation (academic, secondary and higher) theywish to enter?

41. Both of these are essentially quality controls: inthe first case the quality of the educational experience beingprovided and in the second the quality of the recipient tobenefit from the educational experience. The conservativeanswer to these questions is straightforward: we have neitherthe resources nor the human talent for unlimited expansionof enrolments. Re-organisation either within or betweeneducational institutions should only go as far as human andeconomic resources permit. The radical answer to this ismore complex: economic resources are clearly limited in theshort-run and the radical can only hope this is a temporaryphenomenon that can be alleviated by re-structuring thepriorities of government expenditure. As far as pupil'sabilities are concerned, the radical can cite the precedentthat the wealth of human ;: .=.1ent has not run out with partialexpansion of enrolments, and exDerience suggests a complexrelationship between educational standards and increases inenrolments.

42. In the near future these are problems that will be feltmore anutely by the secondary education system than the higher.But it is possible that this is merely a question of time.The combined effect of numerical expansion, political pressuretowards equalisation of opportunity and experience, and theknowledge explosion, may result in similar influence beingsignificant for at least the early years of higher educationby the end of the century. Because of this it is worthlooking at the various overlapping ways in which institutionscan be internally differentiated:

(a) Differentiation by ability - this is thedivision between a population according tointellectual ability and performance; dividingintellectually heterogeneous population intoits relatively homogeneous sub-groups.

(b) Differentiation ts - this isaa ,cuvisionipeso.isnipline: theacademic, the general, the vocational; pupilsin different classes taking different subjectsand/or similar subjects at different speeds, todifferent levels or in different ways.

(c) Differentiation by articularzroups of subjects -here t e differentiation is into different subjectgrouping (arts or sciences, languages or socialstudies, technology or natural sciences) which canbe taken as part of an academic, vocational orgeneral course, to any particular level.

43. The question facing current and future educationalpolicy is at what age will what type of differentiation beintroduced into the educational institutions, and to whatextent can any decisions taken by an individual be laterreversed by him? Further, on what types of information willthese decisions be based, and who will make them?Traditionally in both higher aad secondary education thesethree types of differentiation were used to demarcate differenttypes of educational institutions. The structural reform(i.e. external to the institution) that has been called"comprehensive" education has brought together different typesof pupils and students into a single institution. But simplychanging the structure of an educational system (i.e. externaldifferentiation) may not produce more common schooling, andtherefore more equal educational participation, if no changesare made in the way the school /university is internallydifferentiated. A comprehensive school system that streamspupils into particular lines and subject groups at a relativelyearly age can be just as ri.Tid as a parallel system of education.But, against this, a systaa that does not differentiate on thebasis of one or other of these principles runs the risk ofcreating a demand for education that far outstrips the resourcecapacity of the education system and the economy. Theadditional risk - but here evidence is scanty and contradictory -is a deterioration in educational standards as a result ofstudent-pupil population lacking either the intellectualability )r motivation to benefit from the course, or a loweringin the standards of the course to allow for lower intellectual-motivational levels of the student population.

44. There are two theoretical types of restraints onundifferentiated structures, in addition to the practical onesof the resistances to change: the economic (resourcesavailable and labour market absorption capacity) and theintellectual (the ability and motivation of the pooufgion).What is clear is that the gradual elimination of differentiationbetween institutions will make the question of differentiationwithin them more significant. The trend at the moment istowards the postponement of differentiation and specialisationas late as is practically possible in secondary schooling.In fact, even at the level of higher education, pressuresexist to encourage the general or multi-disciplinary sidesof many subjects rather than concentration on certain subjectspecialisations, and to encourage broad general education.Witness the types of curriculum changes asked for during thestudent demonstrations in countries as far apart as the U.S.A.,Japan, the Netherlands, Germany, Prance and the U.K., and the

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increasing emphasis on foundation years of general education inthe first years of higher education in American liberal-artscolleges, and new universities in the U.K. and Germany.

45. Several things are already clear about current trendsin the nature of differentiation in secondary schools:

(a) With the movement towards wider participation in lowersecondary education, the more popular options are thosewhich traditionally lead to upper secondary and highereducation. Swedish experience with the 9-yearcomprehensive school and the United States high schoolprogramme also point to the popularity of the "academic"courses, and, despite certain pressures to discourageexamination bias in secondary schools, the rapid growthin pupils attempting "Ordinary" level and Certificateof Secondary Education examinations in the U.K. is afurther pointer in the same direction.

(b) New types of educational methods: both sophisticatedtypes of educational technology like computer-assistedlearning and programmed methods of instruction, andnew ways of re-structuring the classroom, such as familygrouping and team teaching, enable the teaching ofmixed ability grou.'s in such a way that the less ablepupil has an advan.;:age and the performance of the moreable does not suffer. Studies of streaming in the U.K.,the Swedish study of comprehensive compared withparallel 6th-9th grades, the Coleman report on educ-ational opportunities in the U.S.A., all suggest thatteaching in mixed ability griups helps the average andbelow average pupils and does not hinder theeducational development of the able pupil. Further,most of this experience was gained without utilisingthe potentiality of educational technology forindividualised instruction and self-directed learning,and in systems in which the re-structuring of theclassroom situation to meet mixed ability teaching wasfairly elementary.

(c) But the problem remains: for how long can such"common" schooling be continued without -

(1) holding back the able pupil,

(ii) putting undue strain or stress on the lessable pupil,

(iii) creating unrealistic intellectual-vocationalaspirations in the sense that theeducational system cannot absorb them, thelabour market does not require theirtraining, and the individual lacks theintellectual ability to benefit from theeducational experience he is motivatedtowards?

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(d) Of the various types of internal differentiation theone that is least objectionable educationally (i.e. doesnot become self-fulfilling) are forms of differentiationwithin the teaching situation by speed of programmethrough similar subjects or subject groupings. Othertypes of differentiation, by lines, by classes, etc.,create the difficulty of later transfer between linesand classes analogous to transfer between parallelschool systems.

(e) To some extent the problems oaf transfer (i.e. keepingoptions cmen), and of teaching mixed ability groupswithout harming the individuals, may be temorary ones.If genuine "individualised" programmes of instructiondesigned for kthe intellectual capacity, motivation,and stage of development of the individual become aneducational reality, then individualised "conversions"and second chance courses can enable later transfer.However, such individualised programmes are not nowavailable, and will only cover part of the educationalexperience of pupils and students. Such educationresults in a group or co-education experience and, inaddition, many areas of the curriculum are concernedwit: a underlying attitudes and orientations and, as such,may have limited use for educational technology.

(f) There are several -2ditional points related to theproblem of standards implied in points (i) and (ii):

(i) The question of the social-political andeducational development of the able, the average, andthe below average pupil. If, for example, it couldbe shown that by postponing differentiation theeducational development of the able pupil is inhibited,would this be an overwhelming argument in favour ofdifferentiation? Further, if it could also be shownthat by differentiation the educational developmentof the less able was held back, how would this affectthe policy decision? Here is an hypotheticaleducational policy choice, implying that there aredifferent educational objectives, and that theseobjectives may imply different educational structures.In the case implied by the example above, a similartotal output of the system can be obtained bymaximising the gains of different types of pupils;the policy decision is which of these alternatives issocially, politically and economically the morebeneficial.

(ii) An alternative position is to state that itdoes not matter in a wealthy society if the educationaldevelopment of the able is held back, simply becauseat the next stage of education - upper secondary orunder-graduate or post-graduate schools - theindividual can go on developing to his/her maximal

STP(70)ll - 28 -

potential. This point clearly assumes that thesociety is a wealthy one and that able pupils willbe retained (i.e. they will not drop out because offrustration or indifference towards education as aresult of being held back). But if this positionis correct, then the policy alternative of theadvances of the above average and below average maybe unreal.

(iii) One theory of learning suggests that thedifferences between able/less able children is notthe subjects they can attempt, nor the levels ofperformance that can be reached, but the speed atwhich they reach certain levels. If the speed ofprogress is the determinant of ability, and there areavailable "individualised" programmes, then thedilemmas posed in (i) are not educationally significant.This is because with greater effort and more resourcesmost people, at least at a secondary level, arecapable of meeting traditional demands. The onlyrestraints on this are the availability of "individual-ised' programmes, i.e. whether they exist (have theybeen developed ?) and whether resources are availableto obtain them (can we afford them?).

46. The bulk of this nzlalysis is directly relevant tocurrent changes in secondary schooling. Its relevance forhigher education is less immediate but still significant:

(a) The various levels of education are inter-dependent;the future of higher education being to no small extentdependent upon the numbers of entrants from secondaryschooling and the style of education they receive.Therefore, the way the secondary school system isdeli glled to meet the points implied in this analysiswill directly influence the future size of the student.body, and the shape and content of higher education,both in the sense of subject-matter and teachingmethods.

(b) However, to see the higher education system as simplyresponding to pressures from other sectors of theeducational system is to over-simplify the situation.Many of the pressures outlined above are experienceddirectly by the system of higher education. Forexample, the expansioa in knowledge - partly createdby the research activity of the university system -clearly has implications for what is taught and how(the curriculum) of the system of higher education;as does the question of the relevance of specialist,academic-type education to the lives (economic andsocial) of the students in the system. Furthermore,specific attempts are being made to re-group subjectdiscipline within the higher education system to meet

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changing views of what is intellectually desirable.Also, the problem of relationships between varioustypes of institutions, transfer possibilities betweenthem, and comparability of courses, does at themoment concern university administration and teachersas well as their counterparts in secondary schooling.Of particular importance here is the problem ofstudents in the "wrong" course or insti'aition and thepossibilities of transfer - the question of flexibilitydiscussed earlier.

47. But the fact that higher education is inter-dependentwith secondary education, and is already responding topressures from this sector of education and the wider society,should not lead to the conclusion that similar patterns willnecessarily emerge in secondary and higher education.Functional differencesexist between the two levels of educationand these will continue to exert an influence on the externaland internal differentiation of the system. As far as highereducation is concerned, two inter-related functional pointsare of paramount significance: the complex relationshipbetween research and teaching, and the need for specialistknowledge and training. The essential activity of primary-secondary education is the transmission of knowledge andculture, whereas higher education is concerned with theadvancement of knowledge. The research side of highereducation is bound to piT_ze a limitation upon the structureand content of higher education, and how far certain innovationsin secondary education will extend into higher education. Afurther important consequence of this is the implicationsfor the relative cost of higher and secondary education.Allied to the "research" activity is the point that universitystudies tend to be specialist in the sense that the studentsconcentrate upon a narrow area of interest. This is partlybecause of the research orientation of higher education, andpartly the specific training being given in the institutionas direct preparation for a particular job. Clearly, thesecond point influences some faculties (medicine, businesstraining) more than others (languages, history), but evenin the second there can be a heavily vocational content inboth secondary and higher education, in the sense of preparingstudents for an academic career. These points are not meantto suggest that pressures from secondary schooling and fromother areas will be ignored by higher education, but merelythat their structural resnlutinns mn.y differ between secondaryand higher education.

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CHAPTER V

CONTROL OVER THE SYSTEM

48. The problem of "control" over the educational systemand its constituent parts stems from.three separate factors:

(a) the resource problems - i.e. the growing expense ofeducational systems brings wit it the need for controlover expenditure, more effective use of existingresources as well as the creation of new resourcesand new utilisation;

(b) the complexity problem - i.e. the increase in thescale of educational institutions (universities often thousand students and schools of several thousandpupils) plus the use in administration and teaching ofcomplex educational objectives (individualisation ofstudent programes), means that administering thesystem and its parts is an increasingly complex,delicate and important task; and

(c) the representatiu1-participation problem - i.e. thedemand from the pupil-student body that they should beinvolved in the decision-making and policy-formulationprocesses both of the individual institution and thesystem as a whole.

49. The dramatic growth in education is commonplace.Annual increases in expenditure of 10,t per annum have beenachieved in many countries - and have often been sustainedfor several years. There are three separate types ofreasons for these increases:

(a) The expansion in numbers as the result of the combinedeffect of demographic factors and wider educationalparticipation.

(b) The levels of education that have been expandinghave tended to be the more expensive types (e.g.higher education compared with secondary, secondarycompared with primary). Furthermore, in certainsystems - but by no means all - the technical-vocational and the scientific sides of secondary-higher education have been expanded at a faster ratethan the humanities. With their heavy emphasis uponlaboratories etc., capital expenditure on the formeris inevitably greater than on the latter.

(c) In addition, systems have attempted various types ofqualitative improvement and this has inevitably meantadditional expenditure. In part this is the capital

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cost of replacing buildings, and in part efforts toboth improve the status of teachers and achieve animproved staff-student ratio. Efforts to equaliseconditions between various levels of education arealso significant, especially between primary andsecondary schooling. For many systems this equal-isation of treatment between levels of education hasbeen the biggest single contribution to risingexpenditure.

50. All three types of improvement have frequently takenplace simultaneously. As a result, educational budgets havesoared. The practical question is how long they can continueto grow, and grow at rates that outstrip other spheres ofnational expenditure and national income. However, the centralpoint is that the increased (and increasing) cost of education,plus the increasing role of the central government in thefinancing of all stages of education, must generate both newways of examining the system and its performance. Not leastimportant of these will be the utilisation of systems analysis,cost-benefit techniques, and programme-budgeting. One aspectof the administration of the system is the need for betterinformation about its functioning. The shift in the unit ofdata collection from the institution (the school, the college,the university) to the individual pupil-student is ofparticular significance in this context. This is the movementtowards individualised data collection procedures. The methodof doing this is the use of mechanised means of data processing.storage and retrieval. But the need for such procedures stemsfrom the requirements for both more information and more detailedinformation about the system. Partly this is to answer moreaccurately and :,uickly traditional administrative questions,but more significant is the range of new questions that stemfrom the economic need to examine more critically the cost andeffectiveness of the educational system. Finally, new toolsof manpower forecasting have been developed and, with them, aew type of educational administration - the educationallanners and the new planning departments.

51. Administration of the system has to be considered ona further level - the administration of individual educationalinstitutions. Inevitably, on both secondary and higher levelsthese have increased in scale - growth in total enrolmentshas been accompanied by growth in the size of individualinstitutions. Administration has been made more complex bycurriculum changes, such as its individualisation of courses -so that timetables become, for example, pupil-based ratherthan class- or course-based; and the introduction into thesystem of people other than teachers, for example, guidanceworkers, counsellors and educational psychologists.Furthermore, the utilisation of complex educational technologyclosed circuit television, the use of computer-assistedlearning and language laboratories - has not only introducednew specialities into the system, but made resources management

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on a local level a more important skill. As a result,educational administration, on a national and local level,becomes a speciality as important to effective functioningof the system as traditional teaching skills. In turn, theeducation of administrators will become a crucial part of thesystem, and what some have termed the "bureaucratisation" ofthe system, with its attendant costs ,will become a phenomenonof education.

52. It is this process of "bureaucratisation" that hasrecently high-lighted the third level of control over thesystem, namely the insistence from students (and increasinglyfrom secondary school pupils) that they have a right toinfluence the educational system nationally, regionally and,above all, locally. The social factors beneath this studentactivism are multiple. In part they reflect inadequacies inthe existing system-overcrowded universities, poor facilities,inadequate teaching and irrelevant curriculum - and thesepartly stem from the rapid expansion of enrolments, No lessimportant is the emergence of new types of students who comefrom social backgrounds in which prolonged education is a newexperience and who often do not accept the traditional valuesof the system and the hierarchy that reflects these values.Allied to this, much of the criticism is not merely about theeducational system, but about characteristics of the widersociety which the educational system mirrors.

53. One way in which this challenge has been manifestedis a demand for representation of studlnts in the decision-making procedures. For some this is representation from,i.e. students hive the right to express opinions abouteducational maters and these opinions should be listened to;for others it it representation on, i.e. students should haverepresentatives actually sitting on Boards of Governors,faculty committees, etc. Further, this is not an either/orsituation - many institutions would grant the right forrepresentation on certain administrative committees (involvingstudent facilities, or where students views were thoughtimportant), while denying representation on other committees(staff appointments, promotions, examining boards, etc).Parallel with this, the right to representation "from" studentscan be granted for certain activities while the right torepresentation "on" decision-making bodies can be denied.One example of this might well be discussions about thecontent of courses,appropriate teaching and examiningmethods. These are all examples of the way the "represent-ational" argument has been developed. In higher educationone result is to challenge not merely the traditionalgovernors of institutions but the ways it is structured intodepartments, faculties and schools. The challenge is notsimply to the traditional hierarchy (rule by professors) butto the way this is structured within the university.

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54. However, represenation is only Part of the currentdebate. Another issue has recently been aired, this timenot representation on or from but participation in decision-making. Again, this argument is not confined to educationalinstitutions but also applied equally to other institutionsin society. Here the central argument is against simplerepresentation and for general participation in the debatesabout educational matters. Ideas like the general assemblytake the place of a university committee structure, anduniversal participation is the substitute for representativedemocracy. The areas which such general assemblies shoulddecide are catholic and often all-embracing; traditionalstudent affairs and concerns like grants, dormitories, studenthealth services, etc. , are only part (and a small part) ofthe activities; more essential educational matters, likecurriculum, appointment's and general educational policy shouldbe determined by such a participatory body. But the keypoint for the present purpose is not the way in which suchdemands will finally be met, it is the relationship betweenthese demands and the growth in size and complexity of thesystem, the recruitment to it of new skills (administrators) ,

and the entry of more and new types of students - new as muchin their maturity, political and social sophistication as intheir social origins.

CHA:Pri'ER VI

ROLE OF EDUCATIOPAL AND SOCIAL CHANGE

55. At the outset it was suggested that the educationalsystem responds to pressures generated by other institutionsin society (economic, political, cultural). What is taught,to whom and by what means, is to some ext ent a function ofdemands made from outside the system. In these senseseducational systems are responsive to external pressures.But the system itself can generate change for itself: oneof the influences on the "nature" of education are thepedagogical principles and interests of the system and itslabour force. Perhaps more important for the presentpurpose is the use of the educational system as a means forsocial and economic change. The clearest example of thisis the attempt to utilise educational systems to trainmanpower on all levels of skill in order to create thenecessary conditions for economic 6.rowth and development.Akin to this is the role of education - especially theresearch function of higher education - as a means of developingnew skills, new techniques and new ideas that are economicallyviable.

56. A striking political feature of recent policydiscussions about education has been the stress placed uponeducation as an institution that creates the conditions for

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economic change and development. It would be incorrect toargue that, prior to the 1950 -60's, propagandists were unawareof the "economic" importance of a trained labour force, thisargument being as old as state participation in education;what characterises the contemporary discussions is both thesalience given to it and the extent to which it is assumedto be either self-evident or empirically demonstrated. Partof the conventional wisdom of the 1960's is the belief thateducation is a means of achieving affluence in under-developedsocieties and a way of maintaining it in highly developed ones.It is both surprising and disturbing to see the limitedliterature on the "economics of education" and how indeterminateits results. In part this is because the literature is ofmixed quality and intentions: descriptive studies of nationalneeds, plans and intention; attempts to correlate educationalexperiences and job placement; as well as analytical studiesof the correlation el education, job performance and economicgrowth. Howev*-, the intrinsic difficulty of both describingand explaining tno rr.l.cl.lonship between two such complexempirical entt.;iec, as t;le education system and economicperformance goc6 ICS 7: to explain why current theories are sospeculative and tentative.

57. Nevertheless, significant work on the economics ofeducation has been atterrted. The most general example isthe effort to relate econic aspirations to educationalneeds; the intermadiats between the two being manpowerplanning. In these, the eapirical relationship betweeneducation (or training) and economic growth is either assertedor assumed. What is attempted is to translate economicobjectives into manpower needs and relate them to educationaloutput. Normally, the relationship between the two steps inthe argument (economic growth and manpower : and manpower andtraining) are taken to be self-evident or not requiringdetailed description or analytical consideration.

58. The empirical basis for such confidence is given bythree types of research:

(a) Describing the empirical relationship betweeneither educational experience and occupationalposition - for example showing the relationshipbetween job and length of education. Analternative is relating earning power toeducational experience, and showing the pay-off(both personal and, by implication, national)of prolonged education.

(b) Correlational studies between economic developmentand growth, and various indicators of educationaldevelopment enrolMent rates at various levelsof education, and the proportion of the labourforce in highly skilled types of employment.

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(c) Detailed case studies of the historicaldevelopment of an economy, trying to demonstratethe role (in historical terms, and the contribu-tion in statistical terms) of education to thatgrowth. Perhaps the most celebrated exampleof this is the "residual" approach used byDenison in his study of the American economygrowth in the second quarter of this century.

59. Criticism of such approaches and their findingsabound. For example, how far the earning potential of acollege degree is a function of the skills derived from thatexperience, and how far it is a function of either aconventional social evaluation or sheer scarcity of numbersof graduates, is a criticism of the first approach; as isthe discussion that questions the relevance of experiencefrom a system of education that has minority participation toone that has mass participation. Both individual andcommunal pay-offs of education in these systems may differwidely. In the same way, studies of the technological gaphighlight the inadequacy of seeing educational developmcnt asthe crucial variable in economic development amongst fairlyhomogenous groups in societies. Parallel with this, therelevance - and therefore the usefulness - of many types ofeducational developments (both mass literacy campaigns andtraditional types of elitist academic eaucat:ion) has beenquestioned by students of under-developed countries. Thegeneral problem of much of this analysis is that it has beentoo macroscopic on both the educational and economic developmentsides of the equation. If education has a contribution tomake to economic development it will be found by analysingwhat types of education (types of academic, vocational, general)are related to what levels of job performance and to changesin what sector of the economy: in other words, it is closelyrelated to manpower training, utilisation and planning on amicro-level.

60. In principle, education can be treated as both aconsumption and an investment. But careful micro-researchis necessary to demonstrate which it is, and in what context.So, perhaps because of the difficulty of doing this, economicanalysis of education has tended to shift its attention fromthe problem implied above to economic studies of the educ-ational system itself. Here different types of questionsare asked, questions about "cost" of the system, its "efficiency"and the relative effectiveness of different types of education(e.g. comparative cost-benefit studies of training indifferent types of educational situations). Acceptance ofthese points does not mean that there is no investment benefitfrom education. Personal economic advantages can be gainedfrom prolonged education when few people complete this levelof education and when there is a substantial demand (foreconomic or other reasons)'for this skill. However, therelevance of such assertions and documentation for a system

41

of mass enrolment is being Questioned. Similarly, specificvocational and technical training may heighten the economiceffectiveness of the labour force and therefore aid economicgrowth. But this is a more detailed point than is normallymade, and may have little similarity with the contributionof sustained general-academic education. Empirically thequestion must be shifted from discussion of education andeconomic growth into analysis of what types of education affecteconomic growth and in what types of social contexts. Further,clear separation must be made between individual pay-off andcollective gains. Some types of education may enhance theearning potential of the individuals but have little tocontribute to general economic developments.

61. Discussions about the "creative" role of educationhave not been limited to its potentiality as a means ofgenerating the conditions for economic change; a secondcreative role is the more general objective of social change.Perhaps the most widely discussed example of this is the socialobjective of equality of opportunity in society and, becauseof an assumed empirical link between education and occupation,equality of access to and participation in education. Relatedto this objective is the use of the educational system as ameans of social reform. In the United Kingdom, the PlowdenCommittee advocated the use of the educational system as ameans of funnelling resources into decayed and decaying urbancentres, and the school as a means of re-vitalising suchcommunities. Similar projects have been initiated in the U.S.,both through federal projects like "head-start" and privatelyfounded attempts to develop "community schools".

62. Both of these are examples of viewing the educationalsystem (or an individual school) as means of social engineering.The empirical problem is how far it has been, or can be,effective. A previous chapter has shown how much - or ratherhow little - equalisation of opportunity has occured througheducation in societies like the U.S., Sweden and the U.K., whichhave accepted equalisation as a social and educational objective.Before taking this discussion further the distinction betweenindividual and collective gains made earlier is worth repeating.It is possible to argue that, although education may not bean effective means of achieving general equality of opportunityor generating the conditions for macro-communal change, itmay be a means of social advance and improvement for a smallnumber of individuals. The importance of this distinctionis considerable: the fact of individual mobility througheducation does not prove equality of educational opportunity -although it might indicate some equalisation of opportunity.Nor does proving the inadequacy of education as a means ofmacro-Change lead to the conclusion that education is not apotent force and means for individual advance: a section ofthe community can derive enormous benefit from education,without fundamentally changing the inequalities in society.

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63. That experience and research over the past twentyyears has shown is that, although individuals can and dobecome mobile through education, all systems are still farfrom achieving equality of admission to, and performancethe later stages of secondary and higher education. Further,despite massive increases in enrolments in upper secondaryand higher education, there is little evidenne that these havedone much even to narrow inequalities in educational participa-tion. Finally, and most depressing, these inequalities havebeen resistant to special policies designed to narrow them -both resource allocation, like student grants, and specialcurriculum-method changes. The documentation for this hasbeen given earlier; all that is necessary here is to statesome of the conclusions that can be drawn.

(a) The Limited Role Education can Play inMacro-social Change

64. This argument has two related complex elements, notall the critics of the role of education necessarily agreeingwith both sets of arguments:

(i) That pupil performance in the system is in part - andmany would argue in large part - a function of what thepupil-student brings to the system, not what the systemprovides. Effective performance at any stage of educationis the result of some genetic influences ("intelligence"),some affective - motivational factors (acquired to no smallextent et home and as much in the community as at school),and cognitive skills (some of which are, again, the resultof experiences both outside education and prior to formalschooling). Because of the importance of such factorsas early life experience and the continuing role ofmotivational factors throughout schooling, the extent towhich educational systems can either compensate for orcompete with such influences is severely restricted.Even if participation in schooling is universal (i.e.during the period of compulsory schooling), actualperformance reflects influences external to the school,as does transition to the next stage of education. Theresult is that education enrolments tend to reflect socialdifferences, and may even reinforce them. In essencethese arguments stress the social context or structure,within which the educational system functions.

(ii) That concepts like "equality of opportunity" mustbe placed into a context, and in industrial societiesthe critical determinant of that context is the structureof the labour market. The economy imposes two broadtypes of restraints: one is the resources that can beallocated to education, and the other is the employmentopportunities it can offer. It is the second that isof central concern at the moment: although education maybe a thing of intrinsic value, it is also in complex

societies a means of occupational trainftg and/or selection.Further, prestigeful and high income jobs nre relativelyscarce, and numbers are limited by the structure of theeconomy; "education" may influence who enters them, andeven performance in them, but it cannot affect how manysuch positions there are (except for the number of teachingjobs, and presumably even these are limited by resourcerestraints). This argument stresses the economic (oroccupational context) within which the educational-systemfunciions.

Taken together these arguments suggest that performance inthe system is affected by attitudinal and motivational factorsoutside the system's control. Further, the opportunitiesafforded by the system are limited by the occupational structureoffered by the economy. The second factor is that ofopportunity inhibiti.on, the first factor is that of performanceinhibition, both limiting the extent to which education can bea "creative" force for social change.

(b) Factors Limitin the Ca acity of Educationto Achieve Change:

(0 The inadequacy of resources given toeducation.

(ii) Educational facilities are ineffectivebecause pupils enter too late and leavetoo early.

(iii) The nature of the educational programme.

65. These arguments can be summed up as too little, toolate and irrelevant. "Too little "in the sense that theamount of money devoted education, and the human respurcesinvolved in it, are too little to achieve any major inroadsinto the inequalities that exist in society, or to generatein society pressures for change. In essence, this is theargument for more resources and an example of the policyimplications are the "more effective schools" in New York.A programme designed initially by New York teachers, its mainobjective was to achieve a more effective education for underprivileged youngsters by devoting considerably more resourcesto the school system. In particular the adultchild ratiowas drastically reduced, both by the addition of more teachersand various types of paraprofessionals and aids:and new skillsand professions were introduced to primary schools, forexample, guidance workers, educational psychologists, socialworkers, etc. The implementation of this policy in certainNew York schools increased the unit cost of education by nearly100%, and meant profound improvement in pupilteacher ratios.This is an illustration of a position which accepts existinglimitations on education effectiveness, but sees the natureof these limitations to be essentially limitations of resources.However, the first results of this programme were disappointing;

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little immediate change seems to take place in pupil performancefollowing the additional resources.

66. The "too late" argument is different, it suggeststhat many of the cognitive and affective skills necessaryfor effective school performance are not only learnt (or inthe case of under-privileged children not learnt) outsideschool, but are in reality learnt before the age of schoolentry. People differ in the amount of development occurringbefore school entry, but many would contend that considerableamounts of cognitive learning (especially language style andcertain types of conceptual thinking) take place beforeconventional school entry. . This suggests that the inabilityOf the educational system to narrow inequalities in scholasticperformance is partly because of a "hidden curriculum"encouraging effective performances which is part of the middleand upper class child rearing patterns. Effective participa-tion of the working class or other under-represented groupswill only be achieved when this "hidden curriculum" is partof the experience of all children. The type of policyrecommended by this argument is an emphasis on pre-school orearly education. This can be in nursery school type facilities,play groups, or directly working with mothers in order tomodify their child rearing patterns.

67. k argualmt inaicatez the La 'act of educatiohis limited by the nature of educational programmes themselves.This is the special programme approach,which overlaps withthe above but must be considered separately. In essence itis an insistence that what is required to involve under-represented groups in education is a special and differentprogranune from existing educational programmes. The "headstart" programme in the U.S. is one example aiming tocompensate for disadvantaged backgrounds by early education:special curricula designed to meet the needs of disadvantagedis a second (for example "black studies", "wider horizons" and"college bound" programmes in the U.S.). A further exampleis the use of different teaching methods to get over eithera traditional curriculum or one specifically designed to meetthe needs of a specific target population. Perhaps the moststriking illustration of such a programme is the use ofeducational technology in various high schools in the U.S.and the "resources for learning"project in the U.K.

68. What these three illustrations have in common is anoptimistic view of the potential education has for socialchange. Their optimism lies in the assumption that theinability of the educational system directly to narrowinequalities in education or society is not because it mustinevitably mirror social and economic differences in societybut that until now too little bsF, been given too late and (ifthe third position is act:opted) much effort has been mis-directed. It is impovtant to note that the three educationalstrategies outlined above are not necessarily alternatives,many educationalists would argue that all three are necessary

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if the creative potential of education is to be realised.

(c) Education for ProductionConsumption

69. Earlier the conventional economic distinction betweenlooking at education as a consumption and as an investmentwas mentioned. Then the context was the role of educationin the social system. The same distinction can be made abouteducation's role for the individual. It is trivial to saythat education ought to prepare people for life, because itis too general a statement to be useful. Less general isthe relative importance of education in preparing people fortheir productive roles (work) and consumption roles (within thefamily, leisure pursuits and community activity). Thetactical problem is that everyone is both producer and consumerand therefore needs both types of preparation. But someproductive roles are so skilled and technical that prolongedtraining is imperative (e.g. doctors and research scientists).Other roles are so critical to the development of the society(for example research and development workers in an industrialcomplex) that again prolonged specialist training is necessary.The former case represents the need for specialist technicalskills, the latter the importance of the innovator and theinnovation; but both stress the importance of work roles.By contrast, many peoples' work roles demand little training,although certain levels of educational skills may be necessaryprerequisites for job entry. Routine manual and nonmanualjobs fit into this category. For such roles, preparation forconsumption may be more significant than preparation forproduction. Between the two lies a variety of jobs (skilledmanual, technicians, etc.) requiring some specialist training,not necessarily prolonged, but with the individual investingheavily for satisfaction in a domestic or consumption role.

70. In part this is a reiteration of the traditionaleducational question: at what stage and by what criteriadoes differentiation take place between pupils? The centralproblem indicated above is the distinction between acurriculum emphasising preparation for life, and thoseemphasising work preparation. Although increasing affluencehas given the resource capacity, and increased enrolments thedemand for the postponement of differentiation, it has noteliminated the need for it. Paradoxically, at the same time,the economy and society may be becoming more conscious of theneed for a variety of skills which are educationally based.These ara the skills of the fundamental researchers, thedevelopment worker translating basic knowledge into usabletechniques, and application of such innovations in theproduction, distribution and administration process. Forother groups the need is for education as a help in becominggood citizens, effective parents and critical consumers inthe affluent society.

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71. Earlier it was suggested tint, for a 4ixture ofarguments that emphasise social policies and economicefficiency, increasing emphasis has been placed upon theimportance of schooling to ensure openness in selection forprestigeful and economically privileged positions. Thismerely postpones and makes more essential the differentiation-selection process. Prolonged educational enrolments intohigher education have further complicated the central problemof which criteria are used to differentiate between students,and what are the consequences of this differentiation. Oneexample is that the traditional irreversibility of secondaryschool selection is being postponed to higher education.This is a question of growing importance in systems that arelooking forward to accepting as many pupils in higher educationas they once did in selective secondary schools. But themain point is the differences in content (both course offeredand teaching methods) in a system that is preparing pupils-students for effective performances of their work roles, andthat is preparing them for their consumption roles.prolongededucational enrolment may postpone the time when this takesplace, but this very postponement may make more emphatic theneed for the differentiation. Pupils-students can only beretained in an educational system into late adolescence if theexperience has some meaning. For all students, part of themeaning may be the selective function of education. For aminority, what is being learnt is crucial both for the nextstage of education and f'r occupational performance. However,for many, the final sta?, of education may be useful for jobentry, but what is may have little relevance to jobperformance. Where it has relevance is in the non-productiveroles that everyone plays. Perhaps the greatest educationalproblem facing current educationalists is designing curriculaand methods to prepare late adolescents and young adults forthese roles.

72. Related to this point is perhaps the most fundamentalquestion that can be raised about the future of education:whether it will continue to be a phase of life (i.e. up toage 16, 18 or 21) or an experience that recurs throughoutlife. For a variety of reasons the idea of "permanent"education is gaining ground amongst many educationalists. Inpart this is because the expansion of educational opportunityis a recent phenomenon, the educational chances of the bulk ofthe adult population having been limited. In part it is aresult of economic change and the need for a variety ofupdating and conversion courses to prevent workers becomingeconomically obsolete. Equally important is the realisationof the potential role of continued education to enable peopleto enjoy the benefits of shorter working weeks, full employmentand economic affluence. The concept of "permanent" educationrecognises he creative potential of a society that is beyondaffluence, and the awareness that the existing population isill-prepared to enjoy the fruits of an industrial society. ToImprove only the existing types of education would leave theadult population unaided, and, in addition, would ignore theneed for continuous involvement of the population in educationfor work and for life.