Formal education can be defined as one of the five major social institutions composed of structured social organizations that concern themselves with the distribution and transmission of knowledge, skills, values and norms from one generation to the other. The institution can be subdivided into private formal education, enjoyed by the society elite and public formal education of the general populace. A comparative view of these two types of formal education through the conflict perspective of sociological understanding justifies claims that formal education can be a source of inequality. Whereas the educational curriculum taught in private schools trains …show more content…
They are private formal education where the children of the elites are trained and they are public formal education for the general populace. Private education constitutes of expensive secondary and tertiary schools were a limited number of students, elected by the school authorities are admitted (Schaefer, 2006).Normally they are owned by individual or private companies hence high tuition fees. Nevertheless they offer a curriculum that trains pupils into leaders of the society such as politicians, business owners and lawyers. Pupils from elite background, children of ministers, members of parliament and presidents compose these schools. On the contrary, public education offered by the government to the general people through public schools train but basic and general educational skills such as reading and writing which prepares people into blue collars jobs such as office cleaners, security guard and menial workers. In a Zimbabwean case study one can point at schools such as the Business Institute of Zimbabwe as models of the private schools where the elite are taught leadership principles where as peasants learn at lowly rewarding public schools such as Chamapango high school in Murewa.Therefore formal education can be viewed as a source of inequality in that it is structured into two types that offer different skills to people of different backgrounds ,the elite are trained in private schools to retain leadership and the poor of society are trained to inherit a legacy of