Equality, adequacy, and stakes fairness: Retrieving the equal opportunities in education approach

Abstract

Two approaches to making judgments about moral urgency in educational policy have prevailed in American law and public policy. One approach holds that educational policy should aspire to realizing equal opportunities in education for all. The other approach holds that educational policy should aspire to realizing adequate opportunities in education for all. Although the former has deep roots in American culture and its jurisprudence, a common narrative is that in recent years the equal opportunities approach has been displaced by the educational adequacy approach, which is said both to have enjoyed much greater success in the school financing litigation as well as to be theoretically more defensible. The present article is designed to make a contribution to the retrieval of the equal opportunities approach. It does so by sketching out a theory of equal opportunities in education organized around the idea of stakes fairness that can withstand the criticisms often made of that approach and by showing how that theory is better able than the educational adequacy approach to address the fairness of a more robust educational policy agenda that extends beyond school financing.

Principles of stakes fairness in sport

“…This echoes Michael Walzer’s principle of ‘complex equality’, which is designed to secure the autonomy of different spheres of distribution. 4 Third, there is a concern with ‘how much is at stake in a given competition’ (Jacobs 2004: 43) or, more specifically, ‘the concern that there should be constraints on the risks that participants in competitions are exposed to’ (Jacobs, 2010: 257). Expecting professional boxers to fight bare knuckle and for an unlimited number of rounds, for instance, would seem to make the stakes too high in terms of risk to life and limb.…”

“…Jacobs insists that it is the first aspect ‘that is at the very core of stakes fairness’ (Jacobs, 2004: 44), and so it will be my central focus here. According to Jacobs, achieving core stakes fairness depends on ‘promoting a wide distribution of benefits’ (Jacobs, 2010: 259). For example,it is the norm for professional boxers to share the prize, the difference between the winner and loser being their proportion of the prize.…”

Rawls, republicanism, and the adequacy–equity debate

“…Jacobs, 2010;Strike, 2008). Specifically, this article identifies serious tensions within the adequacy approach, challenges the adequacy theorists' response to the problem of positionality in education, raises questions about the attempt to place the burden of fostering a democratic elite on higher education, and criticizes their defense of private schooling.…”

The Policy of Commercialization Abolition in Indonesia Equality Education Effort: The Explanation of the Coleman’s Report

“…In the other place, education requires having dreams to realize the same opportunities for education. In America, the theory of contributions in handles justice in education is about achieving equality in the acquisition of education for all [3]. On this stage, several problems must be faced, at this time education has become a commercial item that can be easily traded.…”