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Standardizing Correspondence: Reflections on the Indispensability of Testing to the Process of Social Reproduction in Education.

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Bibliographic Details
Title: Standardizing Correspondence: Reflections on the Indispensability of Testing to the Process of Social Reproduction in Education.
Authors: Poisson, Tyler1 tpoisson@umass.edu
Source: Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies (JCEPS). Dec2025, Vol. 23 Issue 3, p232-274. 43p.
Subject Terms: Standardized tests, Social reproduction, Learning, Academic freedom, Capitalism, Conformity
Geographic Terms: United States
Abstract: In Schooling in Capitalist America, Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis theorize a correspondence between the social relations of production and those of education. They advance the argument that the education system inures students to the dispositions required of workers under capitalism by virtue of social and organizational parallels that exist between public schools and corporate workplaces. Their 'correspondence theory' of social reproduction has been criticized for being overly deterministic, not least because it downplays the realities of resistance in the classroom. In this paper, I reconcile my teaching experience with correspondence theory. Following a brief history of educational testing and drawing on experiential data, I argue that standardized testing cements the correspondence observed by Bowles and Gintis between schools and corporations in the U.S. by nullifying pedagogical autonomy to the end of ensuring alienation. In other words, it is precisely because teachers possess creative and inexpedient agency that testing is used as a means to forestall resistance and guarantee participation in the process of social reproduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Database: Supplemental Index
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Abstract:In Schooling in Capitalist America, Samuel Bowles and Herbert Gintis theorize a correspondence between the social relations of production and those of education. They advance the argument that the education system inures students to the dispositions required of workers under capitalism by virtue of social and organizational parallels that exist between public schools and corporate workplaces. Their 'correspondence theory' of social reproduction has been criticized for being overly deterministic, not least because it downplays the realities of resistance in the classroom. In this paper, I reconcile my teaching experience with correspondence theory. Following a brief history of educational testing and drawing on experiential data, I argue that standardized testing cements the correspondence observed by Bowles and Gintis between schools and corporations in the U.S. by nullifying pedagogical autonomy to the end of ensuring alienation. In other words, it is precisely because teachers possess creative and inexpedient agency that testing is used as a means to forestall resistance and guarantee participation in the process of social reproduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
ISSN:20510969