Paradoxical Distance of Equal Opportunity From Freedom of Choice

• In Event: 56.080 - Roundtable Session 23
  In Roundtable Session: 56.080-1 - Considering Models for Educational Change

Abstract

This study is to scrutinize some educational criteria for equal opportunity in terms of its function with freedom of choice by examining the rationales and corollaries in the conceptual tension between equality and freedom in the capitalistic-democratic society. The phenomena of distance, revealed in the triangular logic of family background, school achievement, and social success used by Coleman Report, are analyzed into the distance of the condition of human existence from human existence itself, the distance of individual from society, and distance of equal opportunity from freedom of choice, as the conceptual basis of the educational criteria of equal opportunity. Educational criteria for equal opportunity are elaborated based on three educational aspects entailed in educational process: knowable, spontaneous, worthwhile.

Author

• AnNa Choi, Educator (Freelancer)