Sociologists and educators debate over the function of the education system in the United States. Functionalists point to the roles of the education system to teach students core values and social control. Conflict theory focuses on the ideology that advocates the rights of individuality, core values in the American education system originally fueled education. Children in the America school system receive rewards for following set rules in the school system such as schedules, directions, meeting deadlines, and obeying authority. Functionalists see education in conveying basic knowledge and passing set skills learned in the school system. The conflict and functionalists helped form a more‐cohesive social structure.
