Option blocks that block options

Once students have their compulsory GCSEs in place and have selected from the languages and humanities they are then allowed to choose two more subjects (or three in Einstein High) from the option pool. It is at this point that the gravest inequality between the schools becomes apparent. In Eagles Academy, despite rhetoric around ‘choice’ and the emphasis on the importance of this choice by the Vice Principal, the pupils’ ‘choices’ are extremely limited from the outset. That is, due to the blocking system, they are required to choose one option from block A and one from block B. In practice what this means is, excluding the BTECs, the young people can choose art, drama or product design from block A and then art, music or IT from block B (see Table 14). During my interviews in Eagles Academy I came across a lot of young people who had been negatively affected by this system. Many had been forced into a trade-off whereby they ended up taking their least favourite subject in order to take a different subject of their choice. For example when I asked Charlotte, a year 11 pupil why she had chosen music, sport science, history and French, she said:

Charlotte …I didn’t really pick sport science I chose health and social care but they didn’t give it to me they gave me sport science instead

Jessie Ok so why did you want to do health and social care?

Charlotte …I don’t know we didn’t really have a lot of options…and you’re kind of like even though you don’t want to do something, even if you

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don’t really know much about it, it’s kind of what’s more appealing to you than the other thing and…Sport science was like the bottom one I don’t really, I don’t like it at all

Jessie So they just allocated you into that one, there wasn’t a choice between any other ones?

Charlotte They told me afterwards it’s because like health and social care and music are on like the same block so they’re on at the same time so I couldn’t have had both.

The above excerpt with Charlotte displays the way in which the blocking system

disadvantages the young people in Eagles Academy by restricting and limiting their choices. The young people are often left with an undesired course, perhaps because it seems ‘more appealing’ than the rest. Additionally, this excerpt powerfully highlights the way in which young people in Eagles Academy often make these decisions without much information about the content of a specific subject. Another year 11 girl, Abigail, had also been restricted by the blocking system when I asked her why she had chosen the subjects she had (music, art, history and French) she said:

Abigail I chose music because I play Piano a lot and the only reason why I chose art was because, I didn’t used to do art and music I used to do health and social and drama, but if I wanted to do music the only way I could do music was if I picked art as well so that was just, I had to do it.

Jessie Oh why was that?

Abigail Because I changed my courses half way through cos I just wa’nt feeling comfortable in it, it just weren’t what I wanted to do at all, so they changed me but I had to do art.

Jessie So but why do they make you do art if you do music?

Abigail It’s because umm it’s in the slots that it’s in, in the timetable.

Here we see that Abigail was not able to remain on her health and social care course when she tried to change drama to music as music and health and social care are scheduled at the same time. In this way the blocking system was not only impacting young people’s choices at the outset but also preventing further flexibility at a later stage. In addition to the ‘blocking system’, there were further instances of Eagles Academy intervening in the

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selection of subjects following young people’s decisions. For example Holly another year 11 pupil told me about having one of her options switched, not because it clashed with another of her subjects but rather because the school felt she could ‘do better’ in a different subject, she told me:

Holly I wanted to do music but they changed it to drama.

Jessie Ok why did they do that?

Holly Because they thought I’d be better at drama than music.

Jessie So did they just change it?

Holly They gave me warning, they asked me if they could change it and I was like yeah ok.

It is interesting to note the way in which Holly appears compliant with the schools attempts to steer her in a certain direction. Though she indicates that the school asked her if she would switch (rather than merely moving her without her permission) she indicates a somewhat indifference to this, as she says she was like ‘yeah ok’. This is similar to the way in which the pupils at Eagles Academy, in opposition to their peers in Grand Hill and Einstein High, demonstrated little resistance to the schools

attempts to alter their career pathways (a phenomenon which will be discussed in the following chapter). These young people, possessing less recognised forms of cultural capital, have less power in this situation and feel less able to challenge the schools’ advice. It is an institution they perceive to be authoritative possessing greater knowledge and insight than they themselves do.

Thus, as has been shown, in Eagles Academy, powerful institutional structures are in place which have an enormous impact upon which pathways are open for young people. This becomes even more prominent during the A Level options as will be discussed later. This kind of restriction upon choices was not prevalent in the other two schools. In Einstein High and Grand Hill the young people had a vast array of subjects to choose from and, in addition, had the freedom to select any combination regardless of timetabling. In Einstein High the pupils can choose from 11 GCSE subjects and 3 BTECs (see Table 14 for breakdown of subjects offered). In Grand Hill they can chose from 21 GCSEs (including the humanities); BTECs are not offered at all. In addition to this difference in the array of subjects young people are able to choose from, I noted an important distinction in the type of subjects offered

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and the encouragement and supporting of particular pathways over others. The next section considers these issues and the classed signals these different subjects send off.

7.2.3. ‘They wanted something that shows intellect that’s why I do

Latin’

Grand Hill’s emphasis on languages and the classics, appears to signal that the young people are likely to have an ‘abstract mastery’ (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1979) and a high level of cultural capital. An excellent example of this is the option of ‘classical civilisation’ or ‘Latin’. Interestingly some of the pupils appeared to be distinctly aware of the value of this qualification, feeling that by studying it they demonstrate a

particular form of intelligence. This sentiment is neatly captured in the title of this section which is a quote from Nile, a year 9 boy from Grand Hill Grammar. Melissa similarly signalled this when remarking that Latin ‘shows quite a lot’ when discussing her motivations for studying particular GCSEs:

I chose Latin because…not that many people have Latin it’s quite an odd one. It’s not that odd but I think it shows quite a lot and also our school does it as two GCSEs but you can take it as like 12 [instead of 11]…Cos the two GCSEs are basically the same as having it combined in one course, you’d have that much in one course, but the syllabus we do does it in two GCSEs so then you’re doing 12 which sounds like you’re doing lots of GCSEs which is exciting and I like Latin as well it comes quite easily.

(Melissa, Year 9, Grand Hill Grammar)

Melissa’s discussion also alludes to the fact that through doing Latin GCSE in Grand Hill, you are able to gain 12, rather than the typical 11 GCSEs. Whilst it is classified as two GCSEs (as you study both literature and language), pupils only have to use up one of their optional subjects rather than two when selecting it. Melissa’s comments also suggest that there is something valuable in the exclusivity that comes with studying something like Latin, as she says that ‘not many people have it’; suggesting that she feels it will help her to ‘stand out’. It is interesting to compare the subject of Latin GCSE with the option of construction BTEC offered at Eagles Academy. In contrast to the abstract mastery and immense cultural capital signalled by Latin, construction serves to further signal the development of practical mastery. In one sense it could be argued that the inclusion of subjects which are directly relevant to and based upon skills and knowledge forms

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developed by young people from a working-class background is a positive and inclusive development of the curriculum which provides them with a place where they are less likely to experience disadvantage due to their social class background (Harrison et al., 2015). However, it is crucial to acknowledge that subjects such as construction are (arbitrarily) perceived to be of a lower academic standard and thus are not as valuable on the post-16 educational marketplace.

Whilst Latin is an extreme example of a subject which lends distinction to the dominant classes and construction is an obvious example of a practical (and working-class) form of education; there is a more subtle yet still powerful difference in regards to GCSEs versus BTECs regardless of subject. All BTECs offer a vocational based form of learning which sends signals about young people’s social class background. Charlotte and Abigail in the excerpts above mention BTEC and GCSE subjects interchangeably when discussing their options. This left me wondering whether the pupils in Eagles Academy have any

conception of the difference between a BTEC and a GCSE and whether this is of concern to them when making their choices. The various qualifications offered at Eagles Academy are all listed together in the options book as though they are straightforwardly equivalent. However as we saw earlier with Kirsty, the BTEC options are not always ‘equivalent’ and some young people end up having to re-do qualifications at GCSE level. To what extent are they aware of this? Hutchings and Archer (2001) found that young people’s perceptions of vocational subjects appeared to be working in contradiction to their aims to widen access to university. They discuss how their participants rejected routes into university which were open to them as they felt that these vocational tracks would result in

stigmatisation. Similarly, perceiving of the vocational route as of lower value, one year 11 Eagles Academy pupil Liam indicated an awareness of the hierarchy of qualifications when discussing his post-16 options and plans to take A Levels rather than BTECS:

Liam I wanna do A Levels. BTECs aren’t really what I wanna do

Jessie Ok and why’s that?

Liam Because I don’t think people look very highly on BTECs and in school the only people that take BTECs are the lower sets…I don’t do BTECs I’m not in the lower sets and I don’t think I should do BTECs in college

Interestingly other young people in Eagles Academy were far less aware of this difference and indeed many of them (in particular the girls) seemed to place enormous value in the health and social care BTEC option. They all felt it was an extremely ‘useful’ qualification

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to have and one which they saw as transferable across industries as it teaches you about ‘people’ which they saw as a crucial skill for most jobs. For example, when I asked Kirsty why she had chosen the subjects she had, she said:

Kirsty Because I know that it can get you to the nursing and midwifery route but then I know that it can sort of open up a lot of other things as well just in case sommat goes wrong

Jessie Mhm, which ones do you mean all of them or?

Kirsty Well yeah really cos like health and social is well people and

everything and you know how they’re developed and all that and you can do most things with that

It is interesting to consider the value placed on this BTEC by some young people in Eagles Academy whilst also viewing it critically in relation to the history of the rise and fall of GCSE and ‘equivalents’ and what this means for the symbolic value of the subject. Vocational forms of education have historically been primarily undertaken and valued by working-class communities (Willis, 1977; Hollands, 1990; Hodkinson et al., 1996). Bowles and Gintis (2011) argue that vocational education represents the most powerful form of stratification, with working-class people being streamed into such routes which have continually been positioned as of less academic worth than courses based on abstract and theoretical learning. Phil Brown, writing almost 30 years ago about the vocationalisation of working-class education described it as ‘a policy which attempts to legitimate the provision of a socially appropriate training, rather than a socially ‘just’ education for large numbers of working-class pupils’ (Brown, 1987: 128). In a somewhat liberating, progressive move, the labour government in the early 2000s broadened the curriculum enabling alternatives to GCSEs to be recognised and valuable, signalled by their inclusion in headline league table figures (Harrison et al., 2015). However, by the late 2000s people become critical of these GCSE alternatives arguing that they allowed schools to ‘game’ league tables.

In 2011, the coalition government commissioned the Wolf review which was damning of vocational qualifications arguing that they were ‘short-changing’ too many young people (Wolf, 2011: 44). Following this they began a major roll back and tightening of the curriculum proposing that by 2014 very few GCSE alternatives would count in the league tables (for a comprehensive overview of the history of vocational subjects see Harrison et al., 2015). Thus it appears that there has been a shift over time in what the system

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government policy. Whilst arguments in favour of this roll back assert that working-class young people need access to ‘proper academic’ forms of knowledge; this policy also represents a recasting of working-class forms of knowledge as inferior or ‘lacking in academic rigour’. Despite Kirsty and others believing in the value of health and social care, due to policy directions, it remains of less value on the educational marketplace than a GCSE, and crucially the pupils at times appear unaware of this distinction. Notably, the year 11 pupils in Eagles Academy would have made their year 8 options in 2012 under a context of an enhanced, flexible curriculum which supported vocational BTEC options; however, upon completion in 2015 these qualifications had become devalued due to the change in policy. Whilst not all of the BTECs offered at Eagles Academy were removed from league tables by 2014, indeed health and social care is one which withstood the cutback, the point remains that as the legitimacy of the BTEC is questioned all BTECs become devalued.

Bourdieu and Passeron (1990: 158) discuss the way in which class inequality is manifested in education through the ‘organization and functioning of the school system’ as it

establishes, through its practices, an (arbitrary) hierarchy of disciplines. With the most abstract (and thus inculcated from a young age in the dominant classes through their abstract mastery) being valued more highly than those more concrete (which working-class pupils are more likely to select due to their strength in practical mastery). In this way they argue that the system ‘retranslates inequalities in social level into inequalities in academic level’ (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1990: 158). Thus the class structure is reproduced through ‘misrecognition’ as subjects which the dominant classes have a head start in developing become legitimated as superior forms of knowledge, whilst at the same time, the subjects which the working-classes strengths lie are devalued. The education system further

perpetuates this hierarchy as the different types of schools, segregated by social class, teach different subjects which are recognised and valued differently outside of the school gates. The next section considers the ways in which the array and type of A Level options

presented to young people– similar to GCSEs - are vastly unequal across the three schools.