To what extent are equal opportunities achieved in UK education?
Education has gained a significant role globally over the last decade as countries have identified a strong link between a growing economy and high grades in achieving a higher scale of social justice in communities. The democratization of education has been and is a permanent desideratum of contemporary society that aims at equalizing the chances of school success in the conditions of quality education. Achieving education for all is a new concept of equality in pedagogy is in fact the transition from 'formal democracy' to 'real democracy', with reforms being achieving this transition. 'This issue is a particular form of a more general problem, which, in the history of democracy, has been formulated for a long time and which always remains open, despite its development. It is a question of the difference between formal and real democracy. The fact that all children have the same formal opportunity to study in all types of schools is not yet proof of the existence of equality in education. It is true that real equality of opportunity is more esteemed than accessible everywhere in the world because the school reality is often disguised, presenting the open formal ways of public education as well as the ways that are really accessible to all.
The involvement of democratization in the field of education implies the effective availability of all pedagogical resources - informational, human, material, financial - existing at the level of society, for the formation-optimal development of those who fulfill, in different stages of life, the role and status of 'object of education'. Equal access to education opportunities is theoretically guaranteed in almost every country in the world, but the practical realization of this generous principle continues to be one of the major causes of reform. The concept of 'equality' today means something more than the equal rights that the democrats of the last century enthusiastically claimed for all citizens; it means real equality of individual opportunities for economic growth, and education is the most important tool in maximizing these opportunities. Therefore, the scope of this paper is to examine the extent of equal opportunities in education or attainments by analyzing recent statics, scholarship research and comparison of the scale in social class.
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The importance of education
Education has a significant implication for the economic prosperity of each individual, of each community, of each nation. Technologies and their rapid evolution have changed the business environment, and production processes and led competition from local to global. A well-educated workforce is crucial in the contemporary world, and the struggle for natural resources ranks second today, ahead of the struggle for human resources. Thus, education has gradually had one of the largest impacts in the world and has taken over much of the responsibility for lifelong learning.
The legislation
The concept of educational equality, where every child has equitable and equal access to a high-quality education regardless of social class, ethnicity, gender, or religion, and where people attain excellence in education based on their abilities and capacity, free of any type of discrimination, is enshrined in many International Conventions. According to Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (United Nations, 1948), 'everyone has the right to education,' 'education shall be free access, at least in the elementary or essential levels,' and 'education shall be led to the complete development of the human personality...'
The synthesis of the policy of ensuring a quality education for all children highlights the fact that in the UK the concept of ' achieving education for all children' is related to the concepts of 'inclusive education', 'child-friendly school', 'child-centered pedagogy' in which the term inclusion is the central pillar for ensuring a quality education for all children. It is known in the UK from the Equality Act 2010 is unlawful for education instructions to discriminate against a prospective pupil or a pupil against the following characteristics: sex; race; disability; religion or belief sexual orientation; gender reassignment; pregnancy or maternity but not social background.
Reflecting closely on the Equality Act 2010 and schools' objectives set by the government for schools, particularly in this case section '5.26 Schools are free to choose the equality objectives that best suit their individual circumstances and contribute to the welfare of their pupils and the school community. Objectives are not intended to be burdensome or a 'tick box' exercise, but they do need to be specific and measurable. '(source The Equality Act 2010 and Schools' 2014 review) The wording of the statement in the equality if it is not a burning for the school it suggesting to leave space for being burning for the learner, which also illustrates the veil of ignorance set in structure by lack of the accountability towards achieving education for all. Lack of accountability of action is evident in the BAME statistics across ethnic groups in education 79.6% of white children achieved 1st or 2.1 in higher education in contrast with black people which are 55.5%.
However, in the European context the definition is more detailed in comparison with UK legislation, Discrimination means any distinction, exclusion, restriction, or preference based on the criteria provided by the legislation in force, which has as its purpose or effect the restriction, removal of the recognition, use or exercise, on equal terms, of human rights and fundamental freedoms or recognized rights by law, in the political, economic, social and cultural field or in any other field of public life.
Social marginalization is defined as a peripheral social position, or isolation of individuals or groups with limited access to resources economic, political, educational, and communication of the community; it is manifested by the absence of a minimum of social living conditions. Reflecting on the UK COVID-19 COVID-19 education experience is exposed in terms of the impact of unprotected characterizes social class is the biggest factor in achieving education for all according to the Guardian 2020 46% of the UK population did not have access to online platforms when the crisis hit in March 2020 which caused sever delay in education progression.
The current state of the UK
Looking further at the UK data available on social marginalisation to LSE data from 2020, the dropout rate for persons aged 16'24 years was highest in low-income families (24%) compared to high-income families (1.5%) (National Centre for Education Statistics, 2014). According to Census data 2010, individuals in the top family income quartile are eight times more likely to earn a bachelor's degree by age 24 than those in the lowest family income quartile.
Reflecting on the global comparison in achieving education for all, even though England is counted as one of the richest countries in the world shows the biggest gap between lower socioeconomic class and higher economic class in achieving education. In contrast, lower economic countries show better achievements in education. (Source OECD)
Education of poor consistency-addressing educational inequality would not have to imply a reduction in academic quality. Indeed, according to a recent UNICEF survey, countries with higher average achievement have narrower reading achievement gaps between the best and worst readers. The Netherlands does exceptionally well in primary school, with a high average score and a narrow achievement deficit. New Zealand performs especially poorly, with a low average and a wide output disparity. Additionally, it is obvious that affluence does not guarantee good educational results. Several of the group's poorest members ' Latvia, Estonia, and Croatia ' do higher than any of the group's richer members, such as the United Kingdom, the United States, and Sweden. Debating fair access based on merit based on evidence indicates that the UK offers a low-quality education.
The prevalence of opportunity gaps, also in countries with the best financial assistance policies for schools, has tempered most of the hope expressed in the 1950s and 1960s; the successes have been just partial, and the ultimate target - a world without equitable resources, even in the field of education - is still a long way off. Additionally, claims have been made that policies that claim to be very egalitarian, such as this free tuition, benefit wealthier social groups. Stimulating the mechanism of education democratization entails addressing the underlying causes of injustice, both in terms of individual (unsuccessful) student achievement and the school organization. Thus, school loss is largely determined by the student's lack of cultural background inherited by his ancestors. This legacy is objectified in the principles that govern family life, which are conditional on social status or social community, as well as in encouraged educational activities (parent-child relationships, family environment, school attitude, how to manage everyday lives, and so on). (Reports from the LSE, 2020) Thus, this illustrates that education for all is not directly proportionate to the economic state of the country but rather to the quality of education and if social class is a protected feature.
An obvious manifestation of the phenomenon of exclusion is the reduced access to education or its total lack. Exclusion from education does not only mean that certain categories of children are not enrolled in an educational institution. The phenomenon is multidimensional and takes different forms and expressions.
Critics state that there is a strong sense of exclusion from meaningful learning experiences for government education in comparison with private. Educational institutions do not have the necessary resources to meet the specific requirements of different backgrounds of learners. The teaching and learning process is not adapted to the style and learning potential of children, which makes them go through negative and discouraging experiences.
Another exclusion implies the life prospects required for learning. Many children live in conditions that are inadequate for health and well-being for instance 1 in 5 families in North London exposed by covid crisis struggles in conditions of insecurity or limited safety: inadequate housing, inadequate nutrition or even lack thereof, lack of clothing, other strictly necessary objects, etc (The Guardian, 2020)
Children from low-income families experience exclusion from the contribution, through the skills acquired as a result of learning, to the development of the community and society. The qualifications obtained are considered low value, unimportant, and irrelevant. Job opportunities that correspond to the field studied or work in general are limited. Discrimination that leads to social exclusion in general is born. In the scenario, a social class would be protecting characteristics this would mean this would mean that better quality education would be possible.
The most appropriate response to the phenomenon of exclusion from education is inclusion-inclusive education, which is the basic precondition for eliminating discrepancies and building modern societies. The concept of inclusive education was born in response to traditional and outdated approaches, according to which certain categories of children were excluded from mainstream schools due to disability, learning difficulties problems, family vulnerability, or other reasons.
Recommendations on the analysis
Reflecting on the statistics it can be drawn a conclusion that the UK educational system of inclusion or attainment strategy exclusively focuses on the inclusion of children with disabilities in general learning environments and tries to change learners so that they can more conveniently fit into an unchanged education system, exclusive focus only on ensuring access to school class, a set of formulas or actions that can be used in any situation or overcoming financial and environmental challenges problems (free school meals for instance or students loans, etc). It seems like a project that can only be implemented by education officials or external experts or a process that takes place only in formal education. Therefore, the educational system in the UK seems to show little efficient adaptability according to a child's gender, cultural background, race, or particularly social status, Even the child adapts according to the system or fails in education attainment as education remains rigid to their needs.
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