At Croft, their teachings surround four pillars that are central to students’ experience and education. These pillars include sports, academics, arts, and service. Croft believes that the combination of these four pillars promotes “citizen participation, self-discipline, Fair Play, and consideration for others.” Croft prides itself on preparing their students for life after school and setting their students up for a successful, influential position in society. With that said, Croft’s pillars along with a futuristic perspective demonstrate a connection to the Bourdieuian concept of habitus and Philip Jackson’s theory of the “hidden curriculum.” Thus, in this blog post, I focus on Croft’s pillars, mission statement, and strategic plan (“Our Manifesto”) to analyze how these components of their school display their elite status.
To start, we can look at the headmaster’s message that addresses the aim of Croft and how they intend to teach their students. In this statement, he says, “The skills our pupils learn on their educational journey here are as important as the examination results, they achieve when they leave.” The headmaster also establishes that he has a background in a couple of England’s international schools, bringing forth the concept that this school is entirely based on an English curriculum. In a Spanish-speaking country, the concept of an English curriculum brings up numerous questions of “whitewashing” and globalization; however, in the context of Bourdieu’s ideas that elite institutions reproduce elites, it is important to note the piece of this message that includes achievement after schooling. One of Croft’s main goals is to prepare students for the world outside of Croft and to make their students prosperous and hold influential positions.
Following the headmaster’s message is Croft’s mission statement. This statement says, “Inculcating in youngsters a love for work is crucial, both for their own advantage and for the common good; initiative and team spirit are encouraged in all activities…they are taught at every opportunity to be respectful and display good manners.” This section of the mission closely relates to Jackson’s concept of the hidden curriculum and Bourdieu’s habitus. Jackson’s theory of the hidden curriculum was developed in his book titled Life in Classrooms (1968). This term is used to encapsulate the unspoken rules that a student learns during their time in school. Oftentimes, this can be found in a school’s expectations. Jackson explains this as a type of “secondary socialization” (Perera, 2023). For example, the requirement of uniforms or a certain hairstyle (both a requirement at Croft) would constitute as parts of a hidden curriculum as the school enforces conformity and homogeneity. Marx is another theorist who spoke on the hidden curriculum, believing it “…reinforces social inequality and maintains ruling class ideology. Education encourages students to blindly accept capitalist values, through the hidden curriculum” (Perera, 2023). While Marx took a more argumentative stance on this idea, Croft shows attributes of wanting to reproduce a ruling class.
Similarly, Bourdieu often talks about habitus, which is the idea that people who share a similar amount of capital embrace a similar lifestyle, and can also be applied to Croft’s mission statement. In the context of elites, Bourdieu (1996) explains that habitus is, “…the shared turns of phrase, the particular kinds of jokes, and the characteristic ways of moving, speaking, laughing, and interacting with others, and especially with like-minded individuals, that create and forever sustain the immediate complicity among schoolmates…” (p. 83). Croft students are expected to act a certain way and begin to develop a sort of “other” culture compared to outside of the walls of their school. Croft identifies what they believe to be “respect” and “good manners,” again reiterating this idea of a shared culture and habitual way of being in the world.
Doing more research on Croft and their school’s aim at educating students surfaced many connections to theoretical work we have surfaced in this class. I found that through their mission statement and the direct message from their headmaster demonstrated aspects of habitus and the “hidden curriculum” that are prevalent in elite institutions.
