Education and Social Mobility – Can School Change Your Class?

Education is often called the “great leveller.” But can school really change your social class?
In A-Level Sociology, one of the biggest debates isn’t just about what happens in schools — it’s about what schools do to life chances. Do they open doors to a better future for everyone? Or do they reinforce the inequalities that begin long before children start Reception?

🎓 What Is Social Mobility?

Social mobility means the ability to move up (or down) the social and economic ladder compared with your parents’ generation. In theory, education should be a ladder — but in practice, the rungs aren’t always evenly spaced.

🧠 What A-Level Sociology Teaches Us

📌 1. Meritocracy vs Reality

Traditional functionalist theory suggests schools are meritocratic — that effort and ability determine success.
But evidence shows that students from affluent backgrounds often have advantages that aren’t about “merit”:

• private tuition

• access to cultural capital

• supportive home learning environments.

These factors make schools less of a level playing field than the meritocratic ideal suggests.

📌 2. Material Deprivation

Pupils from lower-income families are more likely to experience:
✔ lack of books and technology at home
✔ unstable housing or high stress environments
✔ hunger or health problems impacting learning
These material factors can limit achievement before teachers even enter the picture.

📌 3. Cultural Capital

Sociologist Pierre Bourdieu argued that schools reward the tastes, language and behaviours of the middle class.
Students with cultural capital — familiarity with “elite” norms — often feel at home in school settings, while others may be unintentionally disadvantaged.

📌 4. Teacher Expectations and Labelling

Studies show that teachers’ expectations can shape pupil outcomes — a process known as labelling.
If teachers expect less from some students, those students often achieve less — a self-fulfilling prophecy that disproportionately affects working-class pupils.

📌 5. Policy and Opportunity

Government initiatives like free school meals, pupil premium funding, or university widening participation programmes aim to reduce inequality. But sociologists debate how far they actually shift long-term class structures.

📊 So — Can School Change Your Class?

Yes — but not on its own.
Education can improve life chances and open doors, especially when schools actively support disadvantaged pupils. But class origins still shape:
👉 access to resources
👉 teacher expectations
👉 confidence and cultural knowledge.

To truly transform social mobility, education needs to be part of a wider social change — including fair housing, health support, employment opportunities, and community investment.