Theodore Larkin

Sociology of Education
Professor Rubinson

TTH 11:30 12:45

Fall 2013

Assignment #4: Explaining Social Background Effects: The Issue of Motivation

Education is the key to attainment for any individual or faction. Currently, the deficiency in
educational achievement in the United States is one of our most concerning complications. By
examining the commentaries of Robert Samuelson, George Will, Etienne LeGrande, John
Ogbu, Roslyn Mickelson, David Baker and D. Jones one can understand how the future of our
education system needs to motivate all students, regardless of their ethnicity, parental marriage
status, location or economic situation, to learn and experience the eye opening wonders of the
world around them. By reflecting upon multiple these studies and explanations, one can gain
insight into the complexities of interpretation needed to understand the interactions of gender,
class, and race on people's attitudes toward education. Some dispute that only a combination of
theories can illuminate the issues embedded in any discussion of education and gender
equality, therefore, to account for this speculation, one must draw upon numerous authors who
hold conflicting opinions yet include space in their studies to draw on many theories to make
well-informed conclusions.
Robert Samuelson, a Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist, begins his article School
Reform's Meager Results by stating that the waves of reform" haven't produced significant
educational gains and the archetypal elucidations don't explain our lack of progress. In a 2008
survey of public high school teachers, 21% judged student absenteeism a serious problem; 29
% cited "student apathy." While the majority of the public may believe that if students aren't
motivated it is due mainly the fault of schools and teachers, however, Samuelson suggests that

the real cause of failure is decreasing student motivation: "Students, after all, have to do the
work," he says, "If the students lack motivation, even the most proficient teacher may fail."
Motivation comes from several foundations, such as: inquisitiveness, parental expectations,
ambition, stimulating teachers, peer pressure and the aspirations to get into a good college.
Similarly to Samuelson, Etienne R. LeGrands article entitled "How to motivate
students when culture attacks ambition" also focuses on the decline in overall student
motivation over the last few decades as one of the chief explanations for diminishing
educational achievement in the United States. LeGrand goes on to references a few alarming
statistics: One in five students says he doesnt try as hard as he can in school because he is
worried about what others will say and only 32% of teens say their friends believe its
important to get good grades while just 20% say its important to go to one of the best
colleges. The authority of teachers and schools has been compromised due to increased peer
pressure, increases in stereotypes of school being uncool and decreased student motivation.
Both Robert Samuelson and Etienne LeGrand stress the importance of student motivation at
home and school, suggesting that the real cause of failure is the decreasing amount student
motivation.
Another Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, George Will, focuses on the relationship
between African American home life and education in his article published in the Washington
Post: For Black Children, Daunting Divides In Achievement And Family Life. Will concludes
that About 90% of the difference in schools' proficiencies are due to five factors: the number
of days students are absent from school, the number of hours students spend watching
television, the number of pages read for homework, the quantity and quality of reading
material in the students' homes and, much the most important, the presence of two parents in

the home. Lack of incentive among adolescents occurs because more students don't enjoy
school, don't apply themselves in school and as a result don't do well in school. George Will
expressed his support of the importance of student motivation at home and school through his 5
concluding factors: the number of days students are absent from school, the number of hours
students spend watching television, the number of pages read for homework, the quantity and
quality of reading material in the students' homes and, much the most important, the presence
of two parents in the home. A student would become much more motivated if: he/she didnt
miss school often, he/she spent less time watching television, he/she read more books for
homework, the quality of the books in his/her home was increased, and if two parents lived in
his/her home.
John Ogbu, in his paper: Social Stratification and the Socialization of Competence,
treats competence as a linkage between socialization and adult role-repertoire. The traditional
approach to the study of socialization of cognitive, motivational, and social skills, or
competences, in the United States generally makes an invidious comparison with white middleclass socialization of the same skills. Investigators often conclude that subordinate-group
parents are a failure as socialization agents, incapable of transmitting white middle-class skills
to their children. The author argues that typical social, occupational, political, and other valued
adult roles in a society determine what skills parents seek to transmit to their children.
However, in a racially stratified society like the United States, such roles and the cognitive,
motivational, and social skills associated with them tend also to be stratified. Consequently,
subordinate-group parents teach their children to acquire different skills necessary for their
subordinate future adult roles, rather than the white middle-class skills.

Ogbu asserts that the common perspective fails to see the goal of socialization of
competence in terms of current realities, tends to judge subordinate group parents as
incompetent socialization agents because they do not transmit to their children the social,
cognitive, and other competences adaptive to the social, occupational, and political roles of
middle-class whites. Therefore he contends that white middle-class people are characterized by
their archetypal social, cognitive, language, and motivational competences because these are
predetermined by their roles in society. Blacks lack the white middle-class competences
because their own social, occupational and political roles are different and require different
competences. Given the differences in adaptive competences, which exist between the
stratified racial groups, the two groups use different parenting practices most suitable for the
transmission of their respective competences. Ogbu resolves that parents within each of the
two racial groups should be judged as competent or incompetent agents of socialization on the
basis of how well they succeed in transmitting to their children the competences required for
the social, occupational, and political roles open to members of their group.
Roslyn Arlin Mickelson, a professor Of Sociology, Public Policy, Information
Technology, and Women's Studies at the University of North Carolina, answers the question:
"Why does Jane read and write so well when the social and economic rewards for her doing
well are fewer than they are for John?" She proposes that women alter "the returns from
education, not only through the lens of income, status, and career ladders but through familial
and community roles. By presenting empirical evidence and examining four hypotheses:
reference-group theory; social powerlessness; belief that barriers to success have been
removed; and sex-role socialization, Mickelson critiques social and economic theories for
providing too narrow an explanation of the role of education. "A combination of the elements

of competing theories" she claims, "may facilitate a fuller understanding of educational

functions and, hence, educational expansion". In this society, in which educational credentials
are linked to jobs, promotions, wages, and status, women's educational accomplishments
appear anomalous because women continue to receive far fewer rewards for their educational
credentials than do men with comparable credentials.
A further reason for the better school efficiency of girls may be their will to meet the
requirements, to be a good student, to accomplish what parents and teachers expect them to do.
This can originate from the differing gender role socialization. Men find it important to acquire
professional knowledge and other intrinsic rewards. They also have better self-confidence, but
girls aim to acquire social appreciation and other external approval (Mickelson 1989). The
divergence in the choice of courses in high schools is also important. In the 1980s, fewer
women chose advanced level mathematics courses in the U.S and Girls only accomplished the
minimum in mathematics and sciences that was necessary for entering higher education
(Mickelson 1989). Michelsons assertions were arrived at through sociological modes of
inquiry and thereby augment scholarly discourse. Other authors, however, such as David Baker
and Deborah Jones, adopt only one interpretive lens, human capital theory, to explain people's
desire to learn.
Baker and Jones performed a very sophisticated study analyzing cross-national
patterns of gender differences on mathematics performance. The researchers found that, across
nations, the magnitude of the gender difference in mathematics performance for eighth graders
correlated significantly with a variety of measures of gender stratification in other countries
(Baker & Jones, 1993). For example, the magnitude of the gender difference in math
performance correlated 0.55, across nations, with the percentage of women in the workforce

in those nations. That is, the more that women participate in the labor force, an indicator of
gender equality, the smaller the gender difference in mathematics achievement. A different
argument is that sex-related differences in mathematics performance are due mainly to
environmental influences. In this view, differential socialization of boys and girls via
prejudicial treatment, social norms, and the expectations of parents, teachers, and fellow
students, results in the divergent development of boys and girls and sex-role stereotyping
(Baker & Jones, 1993). In addition, international studies have shown that sex differences in
performance on mathematics tasks decrease as females are provided more access to advanced
training and better jobs (Baker & Jones, 1993). Therefore, the evidence suggests that sex
differences in mathematics performance are not unalterable. Instead, rather than a dichotomy
of nature or nurture as possible reasons for divergence in performance, it would seem that
differences in performance are a result of a unique and complex blending of influences and
opportunities.
Collectively the 6 commentaries mentioned point to student motivation both at school
and at home as the most important issue in addressing school reform. A system that provides
more equality of access to schooling across all groups does not prevent the educational
achievement gap from expanding. It actually generates large amounts of inequality of
achievement and attainment within schools by combining highly motivated students with those
who are much less driven. The less propelled student tends to fall further and further behind in
school over time while the motivated student keeps increasing the achievement gap through
their concrete determination and resolve. The great paradox of American education is that
while we have been working to increase the equality of access to schooling across all groups,
in reality, increasing equality of access to schooling propagates an increased inequality of

achievement and attainment between all groups. Its one thing to expect students to achieve;
its another to help students understand how achievement happens. Teachers and parents can
communicate the importance of developing such essential skills as group study and the mindset that with hard work and dedication, they can do anything they set their mind to.
Good students should respond enthusiastically to opportunities to spend time with
other good students, and high potential students can be motivated to be better students
when they are recognized and rewarded for their effort and accomplishment in the classroom
just as we recognize and reward effort and accomplishment in other areas. For students to
be motivated in their studies, they must appreciate that what they are studying is indeed of
real significance, that they are not being feed some new-sprung agenda or half-baked
innovation that will simply go the way of the faddish educational chaff that, once having
gleaned its profits, goes to the winds never to be seen or thought of again. Students need to
understand that they are being feed the best that our nation has to offer and that they are
learning topics in school that are much, much larger than themselves. Students are able to
comprehend the connection between hard work, practice, and an improved free throw
percentage, but individually lack the motivation and discipline to work as hard in the
classroom to master math or science. Some believe that until students understand that
education is an end in itself, that indeed, the creation in which we dwell and the historical
saga in which we take part are truly worthy of our interest and concentrated study, we will
only see them labor with a slaves reluctance.