Unequal Childhoods - Annette Lareau [177]
Ms. Driver, a high school graduate working as a secretary, and Wendy had been unaware of the seasonal aspect of the college application process. Nor had Wendy’s school counselor thought to explain to them that students normally apply in the fall and are notified of acceptances and rejections in the spring.41 Wendy’s parents were very enthusiastic about her attending college. Though many of the details escaped them, both parents were very clear on the amount they would have to pay: $1,000 per month. (Ms. Driver was planning to get a second job.) Wendy’s parents depended on the high school counselor (who was quite helpful) and on other professionals throughout the college application process in a way that middle-class parents such as the Tallingers did not. Moreover, her parents’ approach to educational institutions had not changed significantly from when Wendy was in fourth grade. At that time, Ms. Driver had been very concerned that Wendy was still not reading, but she depended on educators to manage the situation. For their part, high school teachers, much like those in elementary school, appeared to expect that Wendy’s parents would take an assertive role in monitoring, managing, and intervening in her school transitions. But it was much harder for working-class and poor parents to comply with this institutional expectation than it was for middle-class parents, because parents’ involvement often was tied to class resources rather than to their love and affection for their children.42
The young adults from working-class and poor families shared their parents’ hazy understanding of college. The youths had hope and ambition, but their knowledge of higher education systems and the pathways through which they might gain additional training and then transition into attractive jobs was imprecise at best. Harold talked about someday “going back to school,” but he did not have a specific school or program in mind. Katie planned to follow up with a friend’s mother who “was talking about medical transcripts.” Though she was unclear about what the job involved or what the wages might be, Katie thought she would “be able to work at a desk and . . . still be paid good.”
In sum, for the working-class and poor families whose life experience had involved moving into the world of work immediately after high school, college was a foreign country. They did not have the middle-class parents’ taken-for-granted experience with higher education in their own lives; nor were they embedded in a social context like that found in suburban school communities, where applying to college was virtually universal. As travelers in foreign lands often discover, it is easy to make simple mistakes.
Interventions
As the youth moved through institutions, they encountered difficulties of various kinds. Some were relatively inconsequential, but others were potentially life changing. Youth sustained injuries and needed surgery, did not like a teacher they had for a course, had unplanned pregnancies, or chose colleges that turned out not to be a good fit. Parents in the study differed in the degree to which they actively supervised their children’s institutional lives. The middle-class parents saw interventions on their children’s behalf as their right and their duty. They were also generally successful in resolving glitches before they derailed the trajectories of their youth. The working-class and poor parents were able to assist with numerous issues in their children’s lives, but in educational institutions and other institutions run by professionals, they expected the professionals to be in charge. In many cases, the institutions expected direct parental involvement, so parents’ decision to leave responsibility for interventions with professionals (or with their adolescent children) was associated with students becoming derailed from a higher education trajectory.