"Critical" sociology of education has abandoned equality of educational opportunity as an imperfect objective, recognising it as one fully compatible with the competitive ideology of liberalism and, in as much as it is not even realised, one that serves principally to sustain the myth of equality in an unequal society. In this article, the author talks about the concept of equality of educational opportunity in defence of a traditional concept. The author reasserts the essential importance of paying close attention to the meaning of the term "equality of educational opportunity". Not only is the term standard in the sociology of education--and then in a contested sense that should be understood--but an entire tradition of national and international legislation has developed within its assumptions. The debates about the meaning and provision of equality of educational opportunity, in its narrow and wide senses, necessarily require some analysis of the terms of art involved.