Conceptions of School Among Pupils Affected by the Raising of the School Leaving Age

Summary

From among the entire third‐year (13‐14 age range) of four comprehensive schools in the West Riding those pupils who wished they could leave at 15 and those who wished to stay on till they were 18 were identified. There were similar proportions of boys and girls in the two groups, but the ‘leavers’ were predominantly from manual backgrounds and were generally judged by their teachers to be unlikely to pass public examinations. The two groups differed in their conceptions of school, and there were differences with sex and ability, but there was also a considerable measure of agreement: the school tended to be seen in mainly instrumental terms such as helping pupils do well in GCE and CSE examinations and qualify for good jobs; expressive functions such as cultural development and education for leisure tended to be de‐emphasized. It was the would‐be leavers and those who were not rated academically able by their teachers who tended to attach more importance to the expressive role of the school. In the prevailing examination‐dominated climate this may have been a rationalization of their lack of academic success. If the extra year at school is to be an educational advance, the problem of appearing to cater for second‐best must somehow be solved.