Discrimination in Education - Research Paper Example

Discrimination in Education School Discrimination in Education Even though modern liberal world is reducing the rates of discrimination of people in various spheres of living, still it is difficult to argue that discrimination has been totally eliminated so far. In terms of education discrimination indeed exists and seems like it’s gaining more and more profound levels of development, as there are appearing new ways of discrimination within educational realm. Hence, it is obvious that discrimination in education is quite a relevant issue of nowadays society and it has various hidden forms that are difficult to fight with. The modern social condition of the United States shows significant improvement in the sphere of education, as far as some kinds of educational discriminations have almost been totally eliminated from the American society. For example, such thing as sex-segregated education does not exist anymore, and children of both genders are able to study together in the same educational institutions. However, within the scopes of educational process, some gender inequality issues keep appearing even now. For example, some studies report significant data on the matter of discrimination based on gender within the scopes of higher education. It turns out that, according to a sociological research, female students are considered to be less gifted than males, so professors often treat them with prejudice that women have worse learning abilities than men (O’Reilly & Borman, 1984). Thus, for example, it has been noted that the problem of gender inequality in education becomes obvious if to observe in which way teachers interact with their students in classroom. Teachers tend to ask and talk more to boys rather than girls, as they consider the male students more able to give adequate responses because of having more advanced intellectual abilities (O’Reilly & Borman, 1984). This discrimination affects that female students consider themselves in terms of education in a negative way, as they start looking at themselves as lack of intelligence and learning abilities, which frustrates them and worsens the situation. Apart from the United States, discrimination in education on the basis of sex segregation, without doubts, takes place in other countries. The vivid example of the infamous Malala Yousafzai, a Pakistan girl who fought for rights of children to get equal educational opportunities proves that the issue exists. Even though her peers did not probably understand what she was fighting for, Malala kept working for justice and children’s rights in Pakistan. She claimed that girls had the right to get their education and attend schools; she argued that Pakistan girls should have got their basic human right, which had been suppressed for a long period of time in her country. It was obvious that her actions were rebellious for the Taliban regime and that the cost for her fight was her own safety, Malala risked her life. Eventually, her actions received the expecting response and she was intentionally shot for her willingness to tell the truth. After getting recovered, she wrote a book where Malala retold her story in order to inspire all children to fight for their rights and education, science and progress; moreover, she established a school for girls and made a lot of Pakistan children start acknowledging their rights. Another crucial kind of discrimination in education that definitely exists in modern society is the racial one; perhaps, this kind of discrimination is the most widespread and problematic, as the society is trying hard to overstep racial prejudices and get transferred into a new level of interpersonal relationships. Even though more than a half century ago it was stated by the U.S. Government that segregated schools should be eliminated, still the statistical data of modern educational sphere shows that a big part of Latinos and Blacks are still attending the schools which work separately for them (Byrd-Chichester, 2000). Despite the fact that racial segregation is officially prohibited and this issue is covered by the Constitutions of the United States, still the discrimination indeed widely exists on non-official and on some unspoken level. This means that often parents of non-white children have their kids attend the school that are considered to be for the people of non-white race; this unspoken rule works the way that parents of white children just don’t make their kids attend these schools. And vice versa Black and Latinos kids don’t go to the schools where white children study. Racial discrimination is even more evident regarding higher education, which is proven by multiple studies. The Charter of the United Nations requires that all people have equal rights for education “without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion” (Van Dyke, 1973). However, considering the modern situation with racial discrimination in the sphere of education, it turns out that the biggest problem why Latinos and Blacks appear to be less educated than Whites is because they have totally different financial capacities. This also results from discrimination in other spheres of social life like employment discrimination, which does not allow people of non-white races to get better jobs. Hence, these people are forced to get their children to study in less prominent and more affordable educational institutions, where the level of education is worse. Hence, even though it may not contradict the statement of the United Nation that all people have the right to get equal educational opportunities, still there is nothing said concerning the actual opportunities that are not equal for people of different races. This tendency of racial inequality appears to be a vicious circle, as non-white people can’t get better jobs because they have no sufficient financial capacities to get sufficient education in order to be more competitive in the employment market. That is why this kind of discrimination in education is the most obvious, although it is also the most difficult to overcome, as the vicious circle must be broken on deeper social levels. Therefore, it becomes obvious that modern education has multiple discrimination-based issues that are related to race, gender, and financial status of people. Regarding sex and racial discriminations, they must be overcome on general social level, and people should start treating each other as equal. However, the discrimination based on different financial capacities comes from the general discrimination in employment, which should be eliminated in the first place. References Van Dyke, V.. (1973). Equality and Discrimination in Education: A Comparative and International Analysis. International Studies Quarterly, 17(4), 375–404. Byrd-Chichester, J.. (2000). The Federal Courts and Claims of Racial Discrimination in Higher Education. The Journal of Negro Education, 69(1/2), 12–26. OReilly, P., & Borman, K.. (1984). Sexism and Sex Discrimination in Education. Theory into Practice, 23(2), 110–116. Read More