Escolar Documentos
Profissional Documentos
Cultura Documentos
Struggling Advocates
Urban Education
Volume 42 Number 3
May 2007 250-283
2007 Corwin Press
10.1177/0042085907300433
http://uex.sagepub.com
hosted at
http://online.sagepub.com
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Conceptual Framework
This study is grounded in a three-part, interdisciplinary theoretical framework as well as Hoover-Dempsey and Sandlers (1995, 1997) concept of
parent role construction. I theorized that parent roles in education are fundamentally (a) socially structured by class and race but also (b) culturally
mediated by particular cultural schemas and scripts as well as (c) psychosocially enacted according to individual psychosocial resources and relationships within families. Parent role construction occurs at the unique
intersections of these three dimensions, which reflect a mediated system of
structure, culture, and agency. I drew mainly on theories of cultural capital,
social capital, and social networks in the work of Bourdieu (1973, 1979/
1987), Lamont and Lareau (1988), Lareau (1989), and others to explain
broad patterns in the data.
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Social structure, as mirrored in the structure of schools, tends to disadvantage low SES/minority students and their families and reproduce
inequality through mechanisms such as standardized testing and tracking
(Lareau, 1989; MacLeod, 1995; Oakes, 1985). Working-class parents of
color who aspire to college for their children have, on one hand, more systemic barriers to overcome and, on the other hand, fewer resources for the
struggle, such as knowledge of the system. Culture, in the sense of a system of values and beliefs, mediates between individuals and their place in
the social order by giving them various schemas for meaning-making
(DAndrade, 1992). Parents home cultures may be at odds with dominant
culture norms, leading to misunderstandings and tensions in family-school
relations (Delgado-Gaitan, 1994b; Fordham, 1996; Valds, 1996). Agency,
or peoples capacity for making a difference in the conditions of their lives,
is typically experienced and enacted at the individual level. Parents capacity for advocating for their children and proactively furthering educational
goals such as college depends heavily on psychosocial processes and
resources within the family (Eccles & Harold, 1993; Hoover-Dempsey &
Sandler, 1997), making for variation within socially disadvantaged groups
(Clark, 1983; Lareau & Horvat, 1999; Reese, Balzano, et al., 1995). With
the three dimensions of structure, culture, and agency, parent roles can be
examined from broad macrolevels to individual microlevels, with culture
serving a bridging function.
Hoover-Dempsey and Sandlers (1995, 1997) model of parent involvement is useful for its attention to parent perspectives and elaboration of the
concept of parent role construction or parents beliefs about the actions
they should undertake for and with their children (Hoover-Dempsey &
Sandler, 1997, p. 11). Their four-part model theorizes that parent role construction is the key predictor in whether parents become actively engaged
in their childrens education. The next most important influence on involvement is parents sense of self-efficacy about the likely impact of their
efforts. The two less influential components of the model shaping parent
roles are the childs invitations or demands for involvement and the schools
or teachers invitations or demands for involvement. Similar to other mainstream approaches, Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler operationalize high
involvement in terms of conventional middle-class norms, such as parents
providing direct instruction or reinforcing school-related behaviors
behaviors that may not be feasible for parents with limited formal education or English fluency. They also assume a level playing field of voluntary
parent action, understating the constraints of class, race, culture, and school
structure on what they term the involvement choices of marginalized
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Figure 1
Parents Position on a Continuum of Support for College Pathways
Struggling Advocates
Moral Supporters
LESS
PROACTIVE
Ambivalent
Companions
OTHER GOALS
MORE
PROACTIVE
COLLEGE GOALS
(Level III). A similar trend was evident in my study, with the Moral
Supporters comparable to Level I and Struggling Advocates to Level III
but the Ambivalent Companions again in an ambiguous position. Unlike
Delgado-Gaitan and Seguras (1989) neat schema, this study problematizes
the contrasts and overlaps among parent role orientations and examines the
influences that shaped them. Neither schema fit into traditional parent
involvement frameworks, and these two typologies are not exhaustive of the
possible roles of parents in education, thus begging the question of the need
for more research in this area.
Characteristics of the three role orientations in this study are summarized
in Table 1 below. Differences among the categories are symbolized in the
metaphor of hands-off roles for the Supporters versus hands-on roles for the
Advocates, with the Companions marked by a hands-up stance; demographic
contrasts parallel these differences. The contrasting modes, locus, roots, and
goals of support for the three categories suggest one possible alternative
typology of parent role orientations compared to mainstream models.
In bringing the data into dialogue with sociological theories of cultural
and social capital, I suggest alternative forms of capital that families bring to
educational processes. Here, capital is conceptualized loosely as a resource
that can be exchanged for some benefit or advantagein this case, to promote a value and/or a goal with ones children. As we will see, parents in
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Home
Metaphor
Mode of support
Locus of support
Root of support
Goal of support
Frame of reference
Demographics in this
study
Struggling Advocates
Key quote
Moral Supporters
Table 1
An Alternative Typology of Parent Roles
Extended family
Mostly home
Ambivalent Companions
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each role orientation have taken deliberate steps to develop their respective
stores of what I call moral, navigational, and emotional capital. These
resources can be seen metaphorically as yet another reflection of how
parents believe they are supporting, or contributing to, their childrens pursuit of educational opportunity.
There was striking agreement among the Supporters that the most important strategies for parents in promoting college-going were providing moral
and emotional support, stressing the importance of education, and talking
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Strategy
X
X
Jos &
Blanca
Gabriel &
Rosalia
Supporters
X
X
Antonia &
Jorge
X
X
Donna
Alicia &
Luis
X
X
Manuel &
Norma
Advocates
X
X
Angela
X
X
Jolena
X
X
X
X
Frances
Companions
Joanne
Table 2
Parents Most Valued Support Strategies for Students College Pathways
X
X
Estelle
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that from an early age, us talking to her and stressing that she has to study,
has to get good grades because she has to go to universityrepeating that
constantlyhas made the difference in his daughter being a good student.
Although most parents consejos were in the form of general, oftenrepeated moral messages about the importance of education, some advice
was more targeted, meant to fortify resilience in the face of obstacles. For
example, Gabriel coached his child about speaking up for her rights at
school as a Latina, and Jos taught his son to recognize opportunity whenever he could.
In developing their role, the Supporters took their cue from their perceptions of their children as students. Seeing that their children were motivated to learn and listo/a (quick, smart) from an early age or diligent
students in high school prompted parents to encourage their studies.
Indeed, they portrayed their form of indirect support as best suited to selfmotivated, efficacious students. If the students do not have the deseo
(desire) and ganas (will, ambition) to get to the university . . . you [as a
parent] cannot do much to help them, according to Gabriels wife, Rosalia;
Gabriel thought his family might need to change the strategy for their
low-achieving younger son. Similarly, Blanca believed that parent support
should depend on the needs of each child. As Deslandes and Bertrand
(2005) found, differences in adolescent autonomy modulate the degree of
parent involvement at home (p. 171). Thus, child invitations for involvementin the sense of parents perception of the childs school performance, sense of responsibility, and receptivity to parents supportwere
critical in shaping the nature of the Supporters support.
For their part, the two immigrant students of the Supporters were grateful for their parents sacrifices and moral support. For years, these students
had taken charge of their own school decisions, just as they had served as
cultural brokers for the family. Both encouraged their parents to attend
school meetings to learn more about college, but they did not expect direct
parental help. I wouldnt want them to be too involved because theyd be
interfering with what I want, said Antonias daughter, who refused to let
her mother accompany her to Pacific Highs College Fair. By contrast, the
U.S.-born child of Gabriel and Rosalia was more impatient with her
parents limited college knowledge, similar to the Chicano/a high school
students who felt skepticism and resignation about their parents capacity to help them advance in Stanton-Salazars (2001) study.
The Supporters readily pointed to their limited knowledge base and
school experience as a reason for not being more involved in their
childrens college pathway. Gabriel said,
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All the information we are seeing [through Futures & Families] is new
because neither of us went to the university. We dont know what the process
is like. Its very hard for an immigrant family to come [to meetings]; both
parents have to work and you dont know the educational system. So there
are barriers everywhere.
This limited college knowledge was tied not only to parents educational
histories but to their narrow information networks, in which families
depended heavily on their children and on Futures & Families parent meetings for college information. Parents recounted with regret their own lack
of educational opportunity and their parents insufficient support or push.
Antonia, for instance, was determined to support her daughters higher education precisely because her own parents had not allowed her to finish
secundaria (junior high) in Mexico.
The Supporters role orientation corresponds to that of other immigrant
parents who engage in invisible strategies and indirect guidance for education (Azmitia, Cooper, Garcia, & Dunbar, 1996; Mehan et al., 1996). These
parents did not undertake conventional involvement strategies, such as
homework monitoring or attendance at school events. Instead, given the
constraints on their college-going cultural and social capital, they drew on
inner resources of what may be termed moral capital to strengthen their
childrens resolve and academic focus (Auerbach, 2006; Azmitia et al.,
1996; Lpez, 2001; Reese, Balzano, et al., 1995; Trevio, 2004). Moral
capital is related to the concepts of aspirational capital and familial capital
in Yossos (2005) model of community cultural wealth for marginalized
students. Moral capital is distinct from traditional social capital in that it is
not based in middle-class social networks, trust, or norms of reciprocity that
lead to advantage; rather, it is tied to cultural values that are transmitted
within the family and exchanged, indirectly, for advantage by promoting
student persistence and resilience.
Similar to the Latino parents in Stanton-Salazar (2001), the Supporters
were noninterventionists who let their children plot their own pathways
through high school. Yet similar to the immigrant parents in Mehan et al.
(1996), they were not entirely passive; they made sacrifices and cleared the
way of potential distractions, such as daily babysitting or the pressure to
work, to facilitate their childrens academics, and similar to the migrant
parents in Trevio (2004), they urged their children to be proud, strong
strivers in the face of barriers. Thus, the role of the Moral Supporters,
though indirect and largely invisible to the school, was foundational to the
success of children who were already on their way to college.
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his classes are at that level. And hes like, OK, well, have him come back
to my office. It was just like a big runaround. There should be an easier system to guide the kids.
In a sharper social critique, Manuel found fault with a system that claimed
to be equal but did not place all students in good classes for college admission (Auerbach, 2002). Likewise, Donnas distrust of the schools treatment
of Black, male students prompted her vigilance in monitoring her sons
tests and contesting his course grades, which she claimed were often incorrectly calculated.
The Advocates generally persisted in their efforts despite the systemic
barriers they faced. They were motivated by strong social mobility aspirations, beliefs in the active parent management of education, and doubts
about their childrens capacity to negotiate their own access. They portrayed their children as lazy, average, or underachieving students who
needed to be pushed if they were to succeed, and as parents, they took
responsibility for that pushing. They described their childrens education
using the pronoun we to denote its joint ownership by the parent, the
student, and other allies whom parents enlisted in the ventureas in Alicia
saying that were struggling just to pass Algebra 2 or in Donna telling
her son that we could have gone to this college if they had made earlier
preparations. These parents roles in their childrens education were central
to their identity and to the familys determined agenda for advancement,
whether a social climber like Alicia or a protector like Donna. Part of this
agenda was the determination to provide the push and help that most
Advocates felt had been lacking from their parents in their own schooling.
Despite earlier school success, the children of the Advocates did not do as
well as those of the Supporters during high school. They were generally grateful for their parents help, crediting parents with having kept them on track and
seeing parents push as a sign of caring. As they got older, the students asserted
greater independence and the wish to escape parental control, as with Alicias
son opting to transfer schools. As students grades declined and they resisted
parents push, two of the Advocates pulled back from the hands-on role and
underwent a cooling out of aspirationsa common response when parents
see a drop in student achievement (Hossler et al., 1999). Meanwhile, Donnas
son wondered if he could manage at college without his mothers help. Perhaps
being raised by Advocates may breed dependence on parents at a juncture when
young people need to learn to navigate on their own.
In their propensity to manage their childrens student careers, the
Advocates resemble more privileged parents with high-status cultural capital
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(Baker & Stevenson, 1986; Lareau, 1989, 2003; McDonough, 1997; Useem,
1991). Yet the Advocate parents intervened with less competence, confidence,
and effectiveness than did higher SES parents. For example, Donna felt that
looking back, I was storing up information [on college] but not really acting
on it the way I should have. Compared to higher status parents, the
Advocates not only pursued a different approach but met a less welcome
reception by the school (Lareau & Horvat, 1999; Shannon, 1996; Yonezawa,
1997). Moreover, as members of marginalized groups watchful for discrimination and insensitivity, the Advocates had additional work to do as guardians
of their childrens prospects (Horvat, Weininger, & Lareau, 2003).
The Advocates attempted to use their social networks to leverage access
to college-going cultural capital but were at an early stage in the long-term
process of capital accumulation, with fewer high-quality resources at their
disposal (Gandara & Bial, 1999; Horvat et al., 2003). They focused on the
instrumental component of college-going cultural capital or the attempt to
work the system to their advantage. This resource, which could be termed
navigational capital, was an outgrowth of the Advocates social networking orientation and was under construction throughout their childrens
high school years (Auerbach, 2001; Yosso, 2005). Parents basic understanding of how to navigate institutionstrying to open doors for their
childrenhelped keep students more or less on track for college. This was
important for average students who did not seem to have the sense of
agency, motivation, or academic skills to persist successfully on their
own. Yet because parents knowledge of the system was only partial, and
because their efforts to improve their understanding were rebuffed by
the school, the net result also was misunderstandings and detours off the
pathway to college.
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Like the other Companions, Joanne saw her daughter as more academically
competent and ambitious than she, Joanne, had been as a student, with
more options. On one hand, these mothers lived vicariously through and
celebrated their childrens relative success; on the other hand, they feared
losing their close relationship as students moved away toward unfamiliar
worlds.
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Estelle believed that if parents and teachers would pay close attention and
make the child feel important through good communication, students
would do better. The focus of communication about school for the
Companions was not primarily academic but intrapersonal and social in
terms of how the child was feeling about themselves in various classes,
activities, and social circles.
In their acts of communication, the Companions were mainly concerned
with bolstering their daughters self-esteem and steering them in the right
direction, away from the parents mistakes and struggles. They often drew
contrasts between their youth and that of their daughters, as in this portrait
of Jolena, an African American medical records clerk:
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My education was hit and miss. My past, it was real bad and real crazy, but
thanks be to God, my daughter never missed a beat. Shes the only real
focused one in the family. I think shes the right type of young lady. I enjoyed
watching my baby grow up and feel important and all the things she was
doing. I just pointed her in the right direction, thats the only thing I knew.
Jolena involved her child from an early age in almost daily church activities as insurance against risky behavior. As her daughters confidence faltered during high school, Jolena tried to reassure and protect her. Similarly,
Frances, another African American mother, urged her daughter to keep
your head high and try again whenever she was disappointed in sports or
job hunting. As Meyers et al. (2000) observe in a study of low-income
African American mothers, the parental habit of active cheerleading or
applauding ones childs accomplishments can be an antidote to perceived
negative outside influences on self-esteem affecting both academic efforts
and social adjustment (p. 70). This may be one way that Black parents try
to inculcate survival skills for living in a racist society (Franklin & BoydFranklin, 1985; Ward, 1996).
The Companions took their cue for involvement from their children rather
than imposing their own goals. As Joanne said at a parent meeting, It was
important for my daughter for me to be here. Its important for her to go to
college, so its important to me. Likewise, Estelles aspirations shifted
between 2- and 4-year college along with her childs changing goals.
The Companions supported their childrens education in several ways,
somewhat more directly than the Supporters but less consistently and with
less information than the Advocates. For example, all lived outside school
boundaries and placed their children at Pacific High for better opportunities
and safety through deliberate school choice. Two of the four Companions
rarely came to the school but faithfully attended their childrens sports
events as symbolic of their cheerleading support. These parents often
waited until the child expressed a need or the situation was dire before they
stepped in with direct help. For example, all of Jolenas contacts with
teachers or counselors were initiated by school staff, even after it was clear
that her student was failing. An exception was Joanne, who used workbased financial skills to apply for aid online and to protest to a university
office when her child did not qualify for a summer program.
The Companions support was constrained by several factors. First,
these mothers were more prone to psychological problems and family
crises than others in the study, limiting their attentiveness to school matters.
For example, Frances, a hospital clerk with six children, moved several
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times during the study due to a fire, bad credit, and conflicts with relatives.
Each Companion also had an older child who had failed, dropped out, or
been incarcerated. Second, they had little information on their students
academic status and little capacity to help them academically. Estelle did
not check progress reports and thus did not know when her child began to
fail; when Estelle belatedly imposed consequences, her child rebelled and
Estelle gave in to preserve the relationship. Third, similar to the Supporters,
the Companions relied heavily on the Futures Project as their sole source of
college information and expected staff to guide all college planning.
The Companions were more cautious or skeptical about educational
opportunities than others in the study due in part to their own disappointing
experiences, prompting them to engage in warnings and protective behavior.
For example, Joanne advised her child not to take Advanced Placement
classes, If theyre an average student, they should just stay where theyre at
because if the class is too hard for them . . . then theyll be stuck . . . and
theyll end up losing. Similarly, she was not sure if her child was mature
enough for the big adventure of college and often told her, College is not
easy, you know, its not high school. Having been alienated from school
herself, she projected her own experience onto her child. Other parents worried about structural barriers with changes in affirmative action and financial
aid policies. There are so many things that are being taken away now,
Frances noted, theyre making it even harder to get in to college.
The Companions were more likely than others in the study to see college
as a threat in addition to an opportunity. They felt threatened by the
prospect of students leaving home for college as a disruption of family relationships and routines. This ambivalence led to mixed messages about college. When her child was determined to go to a state college far from home,
Estelle said, I would never tell her no, but Im dreading it. . . . I would
never stop her or disappoint her, but its hard to accept that shes gonna be
gone. Especially being the only girl. Jolena insisted that regarding her
daughters future, Im not going to hold her backI am not, but she
added that if things dont work out the way that she wants them to, my
doors always open.
These single mothers, while giving generous emotional support, clearly
depended on the mother-daughter bond for their own emotional well-being.
Frances and Jolena described sharing fun times with their daughters like
they would with a best girlfriend. Frances, with her many troubles, relied
on her daughter for daily words of prayer and encouragement as well as
babysitting and transporting her younger children: Shes my strength, she
keeps me going. She often told relatives and Futures Project staff how
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lost she would be with her daughter gone. The stronger the family bonds
and obligations, the more vulnerable these parents were to feeling abandoned for college. All parents struggle to some extent to let go of collegebound children, but this may well play out differently among working-class
single mothers and daughters.
The daughters academic performance ranged from low average to high
average, with a marked gap for two students between their capacity for critical thinking and lackluster grades. They generally appreciated their mothers emotional support but would have liked more tangible support, such as
more effort to come to parent meetings related to college. As Estelles
daughter said, her mother was better at childrearing than at helping with
school matters. Joannes daughter complained of academic pressure without help at home, saying, Its all on me. The turmoil in these relationships
increased near graduation, with even the closest mother-daughter pair fighting over college choices and Frances opposing all out-of-town options.
In their cheerleading, protective stance, the Companions resemble many
minority parents who deliberately instill self-confidence, pride, and resilience
in their children as part of racial socialization to resist the corrosive effects of
poverty or racism (Clark, 1983; Fordham, 1996; Franklin & Boyd-Franklin,
1985; Meyers et al., 2000; Ward, 1996; Yosso, 2005). The Companions took
pride in their daughters as the hope of an extended family that had generally
not succeeded in the system, but the Companions also felt cautious about the
future and skeptical about college, extrapolating from their own struggles in
school and as single women in the workplace. In their reluctance to deal with
school staff, these parents expressed the ambivalence of their student days and
their wariness of mainstream institutions (cf. Fordham, 1996; Lareau &
Horvat, 1999). In this, they evoke Ogbus (1987) theory of involuntary minorities, such as African Americans and second-generation Mexican Americans,
who tend to be more conflicted than voluntary minorities (first-generation
immigrants) about the value of participation in school opportunity structures.
In the end, the Companions supported their childrens educational goals
by drawing on their reserves of what could be termed emotional capital,
an intuitive, gendered response attuned to their childrens feelings and selfesteem. This resource was built on a foundation of years of close motherdaughter communication, but it was complicated by tense parent-teen
dynamics and mothers dependence on their daughters in single-parent
households. Child gender, parent gender, and parent marital status shaped
the close parent-child bond and parent role construction in these families,
with mothers attempt to hold on to relationships clashing with college goals.
The net effect for students was mixed messages and inconsistent support.
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