John Rury And David Labaree: The Three Goals Of American Education

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The history of education is something that can be explain in many ways and have many reasonings but still address the same point. Authors John Rury and David Labaree are both making arguments about the history of education, but are using different language to make their points. They both have a theory about what the three main goals for American education were, but use different terms and ideas to make their argument. John Rury claims that the three main goals of American education is social capital, human capital, and cultural capital. However, David Labaree argues that the three main goals of American education is democratic equality, social efficiency, and social mobility.
John Rury is a historian of American education and the author of
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Labaree uses the term social efficiency as a goal for American education. Social efficiency is the idea that schools should focus on training workers. He explains this goal is form through the trend of vocationalism. Another term he uses to explain the goal of education is social mobility. Social mobility is the idea that schools should prepare individuals to compete for social positions (Labaree, 1997). Meaning that schools should equip students with the tools they need in order to move up in social …show more content…
Rury’s term social capital relates to Labaree’s term social efficiency because both agrees that people should obtain jobs and other advance positions. Also, the terms human capital and social mobility are related because both are about people moving up in society and benefiting from the knowledge and jobs they have that other do not have. The broader picture of what their believed to be goals of American education also relate. Rury’s goals all come together to support the ideology of equity, which is the idea of equality of outcome and opportunity. While Labaree’s goals all relates back to his broaded idea that American education is about democratic equality, which idea that schools should prepare citizens. These two terms are very similar for the fact that they both mean that American education is about citizenship training, equal treatment, and equal

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