Social Efficiency Ideology

To efficiently produce well-functioning student/adults in society

Aims:

Child: Child not as important as the potential adult. Child seen as raw material with
potential to be well functioning adult in society
Learning measured in observable behavioral changes. Goal is student responds
Learning: correctly to stimuli. Stimuli can be manipulated to produce desired learner
experiences
Teachers are instruments to achieve society’s terminal objective. – a well-
Teaching: functioning adult. Teachers are expected to be efficient and produce necessary
behavioral changes as quickly as possible
Knowing some fact is NOT as important as behaving correctly based on the known
Knowledge: fact. Behavior is more important than just random facts. Knowledge can be
partitioned into many activities that adds up to the terminal objective
Evaluate if learner has mastered each progressive step towards the terminal
Evaluation: objective. Not concerned with ranking but the observable behavioral changes that
support mastery achieved.
The Social Efficiency ideology and TEKS are aligned in the way the standards are stated to

encourage learners to exhibit some type of behavioral change. While just being able to spout

information is not necessarily the form of knowledge sought by SEs, to be able to act upon that

knowledge when the appropriate stimulus is given is seen as a behavioral change. While all the

TEKS use phrases commonly found within the SE context, I believe the non-discipline areas of

TEKS are more within the SE realm. For instance, Technical Applications, Art, Choir, or Dance all

require the students to be able to respond appropriately based on the given stimuli. These subjects

then go a step further in that they are usually subjects where students are evaluated based on a

performance of some kind. Their learned behavior is a direct result of a given stimuli and the

responses to it. Also, these subjects line up very effectively with the way SEs like to develop

curricula. Each subject is evaluated with an activity analysis that allows the curricula developer to

develop steps to reach the terminal goal. In band the terminal goal may be playing the instrument,

but the steps are many: how to position the instrument, how to read music, etc.
Concerning SE evaluation and Texas Accountability Ratings System, I don’t see an alignment for

the core subject. The Rating System is ordinal. Students are compared to each other; schools and

districts are all compared to each other and ranked according to their perceived successes. On the

other hand, the SE’s view evaluation based on evaluating a set standard then assigning a pass/fail

grade. SEs are more concerned with mastery of each progressive step to gain mastery of the

terminal objective.