Sociology Podcast - Social Class & Inequalities in Education

The podcast discusses social classes and inequalities in education. Social classes are based on factors like wealth, income, occupation, and education. The upper class has access to resources and power, the middle class earns enough money for a comfortable life, and the lower class has limited resources. Education inequalities involve the unequal distribution of academic resources. Middle and upper class individuals have more access to quality education, while those from lower class backgrounds may attend schools with fewer resources. The connection between social class and education inequalities is that resources and funding can limit one's ability to achieve success. Hello and welcome to this week's social podcast. My name is Mikayla and we're going to be talking about social classes and inequalities in education today. Let's do a quick breakdown. In section one, we'll be discussing social classes, then we will move into education inequalities. And lastly, we'll be talking about the connection between the two. Let's go ahead and get started. My source for section one of social classes consists of the class slides from week seven, which include 10-2, 10-4, and 10-6. Social classes are based on social factors and accomplishments. Some social factors include, but are not limited to, wealth, income, occupation, and education. Social classes are based on social factors and accomplishments. Some social factors include, but are not limited to, wealth, which is the net value of an individual's asset and money, income, a person's wages, occupation, which is one's job, and of course, education. Social stratification reflects the unequal distribution of these resources available between social classes. And what are the social classes, you may ask? The social classes are made up of the upper class, which are individuals that have access to large amounts of material resource and power. They also have control over their own lives and are able to influence others. This would be the top 20% of our society. The middle class individuals, they earn enough money to live a comfortable life. They have varying occupations as white collar workers, and this consists of almost over half of the population. And last but not least, the lower class. The lower class are individuals who have limited resources and inadequate systems. These types of people also acquire occupations in service positions at minimum wage. This could be custodial or food service. And these individuals make up the bottom 20% of our society. As you can see, the classes definitely differ from each other. In essence, they are unequal. Now let's move on to section two and dive into education inequalities. Social inequality is the unequal sharing and distribution of academic resources among social groups. This would include school funding, the supply of teachers and their qualifications, the latest technologies like computers, and also books, so textbooks. Obviously there are a lot of resources and materials that go into education. The middle class can be a key factor in this when it comes to the quality of early education and even continuing education like going to college. Those from an upper class may attend a private school with more resources and more material. Those from the middle class or lower class may attend public schools with less resources and less material. These materials make a great impact on an individual's life when it comes to education. The quality of education can really affect your growth and the continuing of education as you get older. It can even affect the type of job that you would like to have one day. So those with maybe a private education as opposed to a public education may have a greater chance in life at achieving these goals than those that would be in a public education system. Let's take a dive into section three, which is the connection between social class and inequalities in education. Like I said before, education inequalities are very effective in how one's whole life is shaped. It can really determine how far an individual goes in their success as resources are a limiting factor. I'm going to show you the connection using a real world example that is personal to my life. Because of the amount of money that my parents earned, I did not qualify for as much financial aid or scholarships. However, my parents are not financially supporting my college. It was projected that over a quarter of what my parents earned would go towards my first year of school. Most households cannot afford this. So in order to afford my education, I had to find scholarships that were not based on parental income. Currently, I am paying for school through scholarships and I'm able to pursue a degree in nursing. But what about those who don't have funding? From the Kindle Reader, Making Invisible Visible, Applying Sociology to Our World, and the chapter The Private Safety Net in Emerging Adulthood, I found this piece of information. In a survey of young adults ages 18 to 28, 40% of them were provided parental support to further their education. This shows that not all struggle with educational inequalities in the money sense. Many people do not have to worry about where their funding is coming from. However, there are many individuals in our society who long to further their education, but because of the lack of resources and funding, they are unable to. Those in the lower class have lesser chances to further their education, but a greater chance to have funding provided as they would qualify for more scholarships or grants because their household would not be expected to pay more. Those in the middle class have greater chances of going to school, but may be limited as they have a lesser chance of gaining funding for their education. This example applies to my life personally. Those in the upper class may not have to worry about funding at all, but their chances of school may be less because it's not something that they need. There is an obvious disconnect in our society when it comes to gaining access to education. Because of limitations in funding and resources, it can definitely limit one's ability to achieve great things in their life. Those in the lower class may have a chance to escape it through gaining education, but the question is if the system and society will let them. If you look at those in our society, you can tell that many of us may have the same brain power and the same knowledge to pursue a degree, but it is really up to the resources and funding to whether or not we can achieve that. And it's really sad to see the education inequalities and the effects that they have on people's lives because they truly can be limiting if you do not have resources or funding. Thank you guys for listening to my podcast this week. We just talked about the social classes and the inequalities in education and a personal life connection between the two for me. I hope you all enjoyed and we'll see you next week.