Unequal Childhoods - Annette Lareau [183]
Unquestionably, working-class and poor parents provided valuable emotional, financial, and social support for their children. They cosigned car loans, paid for car insurance, provided meals, listened to tales of romantic woes, and babysat grandchildren. They desperately wanted their children to succeed. Yet, as when their children were young, with regard to educational institutions, these parents continued to expect that the experts would help their children succeed. They did not assertively manage their children’s high school careers; and once the children had either graduated or left high school, their parents considered them autonomous adults.
“It Broke My Heart”
Overall, the working-class and poor youth in Unequal Childhoods aspired to graduate from high school and go to college, but compared to the middle-class youth, they were less successful in realizing this dream. Most achieved educational levels similar to those of their parents, many of whom were high school dropouts. Given these parents’ own educational experiences, we might expect them to be relatively untroubled when their children dropped out of high school or did not persist in college. Instead, working-class and poor parents displayed striking levels of pain as they discussed their children’s truncated educational careers.52 Ms. Taylor, for instance, looked sad and put her hand over her heart when I asked her about Tyrec dropping out of community college after one semester. She said that she “felt helpless” and was “disappointed, you know, as a mother would be.” Noting the independence of young adults and the limited power of parents, however, she said, “You know, you just can’t do it. They have to do it on their own.”
Other parents echoed this view. They also drew attention to the wounds parents experienced when their dreams for their children’s educational careers were dashed. For example, Ms. Driver took Wendy’s refusal to go to college personally: “I was hurt. I wanted my child to go to college.” Harold’s failure to remain in high school until he graduated enraged his mother. Although it was two years after Harold had dropped out, Ms. McAllister grew angry as she recalled her son’s action: “When Harold didn’t graduate, I was mad. (voice rising) All he had to do was graduate, two months—April, May, and June.” Discussing Billy’s decision to leave high school in his sophomore year, Mr. Yanelli, who was a high school dropout, said, “It broke my heart.”
Middle-class parents generally were spared this kind of crushing disappointment. They clearly empathized with their children over setbacks such as not getting into their first-choice college, but typically these parents seemed less deeply affected than the working-class and poor parents. Ms. Tallinger, for example, reported that she was “really sad” for Garrett when Stanford did not work out, noting wistfully, “It would have been great.” Still, the Handlons, the only middle-class couple in the study whose child did not go to college, were very unhappy with their daughter’s decision. Melanie enrolled at Swan Community College, but as noted earlier, she stopped going to class before the semester ended. For Ms. Handlon, who had an associate’s degree, and Mr. Handlon, who had a master’s degree, Melanie’s short-lived college career was a major disappointment.
ANNETTE: And how did you feel about this when this was going on?
MS. HANDLON: Disappointed, but it’s her life, I, you know, . . . at this point she’s gonna start making the decisions, and