In America, a person’s social class plays a huge part in the type of education they will receive. This, in turn, determines how well they will succeed in their adult lives. A study done in 1999 found that on average there was a direct correlation showing the higher the family’s income, the better the student did on their SATs (710). This paper will examine the different educational experiences each social class undergoes. It will also look more in depth into the lives of three individuals who represent each of the social classes, and examine their educational background up to their present day careers and assets.…
Life happens in ways you cannot control. People have hard times to achieve an education due conflicts they have no control over. Many statistics show the many ways of what will most likely happen to people that are born into a certain class. In the articles, “Homeless on Campus” by Eleanor J. Bador, “Fremont High School” by Jonathan Kozol, and “Of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%” by Joseph E. Stiglitz, show many ways of how society forms one person’s life in a way they cannot control. America displays their citizens as equal, but these reports published by the authors suggest otherwise by explaining the unequal lifestyles of the high, middle, and low class of America.…
“For the most part, class avoidance of class-laden vocabulary crosses class boundaries” (Mantsios 304). There are measurements in salary, physical appearance, and education to determine class. Mantsios studies showed that 34 percent of America’s wealth is held by the one percent, and almost one of every eight people are living below the poverty line ($19,307 dollars for a family of four in 2004). But it is not getting any better, since it has increased approximately $4,000 since then. One of the biggest reasons people are in poverty is because people cannot afford proper education to become well-sustained. It is all dependent on factors beyond our control. Mantsios compared class backgrounds of a life of a white male, whose father is a manufacturer and an industrialist who was enrolled in a prestigious preparatory school, and a black female, whose father a janitor and mother a waitress who lives in the ghetto. Who do you think has more of an advantage in life? The white male, as a result of opportunity handed to…
Donna Langston, in “The Difference Among US: Divisions and Connections” (2003), questions the availability of the “equal opportunity” that the U.S. is proud of. As much as the people would like to deny that people are born into a certain economic class, and will most likely remain in that class for the rest of the life, it is true. As she puts it, “some were born with silver shoe horns” (Langston 371), people who are born into a financially stable environment would likely remain financially well off their entire life, by going to school and becoming a skilled professional and the chances of people born into the working class obtaining higher education are highly jeopardized. Langston’s belief does not just apply to to the people’s finances, but also their culture. The class you are raised in influences “your understanding of the world and where you fit in; it’s composed of ideas, behavior, attitudes, values, and language” (Langston 372). One’s finances decides where he can live, what school he can attend, what kind of social life they can have, and thus creates a kind of community that he is a part of. The claim that everyone has equal opportunity causes people of the working class to feel that they are the cause of their position in society and their problems when in reality they have very limited opportunity to change their lifestyle.…
| This sociologist argues that the values and beliefs of lower class subcultures are self imposed barriers to educational career and success. The lower class believe they have less oppourtunity for induvial achievement.…
For a rich male it probable to lose a lot of ethical behavior. A rich male may believe he is superior to the rest because of his education. Some rich males may have been born rich and have gained no morals because of their lifestyle. Many rich males may easily become addicts because of their free time. The rich male may believe he makes the rules because of the way they were raised. Without a doubt males economic standpoint definitely plays a big role in their attitudes and beliefs. I encourage everyone to try to break these barriers that society has thrown on us and make a difference on this earth after all rich or not we all continue to be human…
Education is a major component of social class since it has affect on both higher and lower social classes. Individuals from higher social classes are more likely to attend better schools and more likely to receive higher education. Educational inequality is one factor that perpetuates the class divide across generations. These social domains directly impacts on what and how much children learn. Children growing up in low-income neighborhoods, for example, are much more likely to experience constant stress which may have an effect on their minds, cognitive skills and abilities. “The disparities between rich and poor families and neighborhoods have increased, exacerbating the differences between schools and widening the gap in opportunities.” (Stephens and Marcus 5)…
Socioeconomic status, race/ethnicity and gender play a huge influence on health status as it subconsciously influences the way physicians interacts with patients, the sort of treatment patients receive at hospitals, and how their health is overall based on how society influences them. The main trends noticed throughout time is that the lower your socioeconomic status is, the poorer your health status is; if you are African-American, Hispanics, etc… receive poorer treatments because of the stereotypes toward their ethnicity in society and because these races tend to have lower SES than other races; for gender, men tend to take on riskier careers in comparison to women so they tend to die earlier and visit the hospital more often while women tend to take better care of themselves and seek medical treatment more often than…
One item I had found similar to my classmates was what is actually considered privileged. During the Privilege Exercise, I came to learn circumstances I…
For instance, my high school had access to numerous extracurricular activities, college preparatory help, and support systems for its mostly white population of students from dual enrollment to support for young caregivers. A sociological perspective would comprehend with their description that, “educational attainment appears to be related to race rather than being a random phenomenon….Overall dropout rates declined between 1972 and 2005, from 15 percent to 9 percent, but dropout rates are still much higher for many minority youth” (Fitzgerald, 2014, p. 217-218). These statistics account for individuals’ capability to pursue higher education which encompasses structural circumstances, such as how race and class privilege are key roles in their high school opportunities. In essence, the disparities of schooling paint hard truths of restrictions even before they obtain a postsecondary degree following educational inequalities along racial lines or achievement…
Throughout the United States, there are many regular disparities among our education system. First, there is an alarming disparity in education especially in the United States. Students from lower socioeconomic statuses do not always receive the same education as those from higher socioeconomic statuses for many reasons. In areas with lack of resources there tends to be poorer school institutions in comparison to wealthier neighborhoods. In addition, public schools are funded by taxes and therefore, the quality of teachers and amount of resources depends on the quantity of taxes individuals pay. Within these areas, families…
While doing the walk of privilege I thought I would learn a lot about myself, but I really didn’t. Instead of learning I prefer to see it as I came to a realization about my life. And that was, that I am so very privileged, more then I had ever thought of before. “The Walk of Privilege” that I took in my Anth 280 class made me see how very lucky I am. While we as a class all started in the same spot, on the same line, we all ended up very far away from each other. Some of us ahead of the line, and some of us behind the line. While doing this exercise not once did I take a step back. I took fourteen steps forward though. Fourteen steps forward and no steps back is proving how privileged I really was. I learned that even though I thought I had it “rough” sometimes as a kid, there were so many people who had it much worse. I saw that in my class. When “The Walk of Privilege” exercise was over and I was counting my steps backwards to the starting line a lot of my class was counting their steps forward to the starting line. That means that they just had so many more struggles then I would have ever imagined having in my life. Yet, we all have been accepted and are attending University of Illinois which is a nationally ranked school, and one of the best research universities in the nation.…
The first factor that influences human development is a person’s socioeconomic status. This indicates a person’s position in society as determined by income, wealth, occupation, education, and place of residence. As a child, socioeconomic status has a big effect on the way a child is raised and the opportunities available to him/her. Children that come from high socioeconomic status families typically are more successful because they have more resources readily available to their children. They are able to afford high-quality childcare, education, and healthcare. Their children are also typically more involved in recreational sports and extra-curricular activities broadening their children’s horizons and talents. Children that are raised in low socioeconomic families lack the financial, educational, and social support that would make them feel equal to children from higher social standing families. These feelings of unease and not fitting in can lead to low confidence and low motivation. Children have to live with these feelings and the circumstances they were born into until they become adults and can make their own livings. Anyone is capable of overcoming his or her circumstances! When children grow up, they get to decide how far they want to take their education and what type of career field they want to go into as…
Another significant privilege was my inexperience of racialized social control in my educational capital. Racialize social control is the regulation and repression of a certain race (Rios, 30). To illustrate, my high school was divided into two; the top floor was the magnet program and the rest of the school was for regulars. The schools physical structure depicts the social class within the school system that students are categorized into. Ironically, I was enrolled in the regular school, but because of my outstanding GPA from middle school my classes were a mixed of both magnet and regular. As a result, by being exposed to both magnet and regular classes I witness the inequalities within my schools educational system. The kids in the regular school were known…
I would categorize myself in the middle to high status class in my country and this has, in many ways affected my educational opportunities. I lived in a town known as Diego Martin and though my neighborhood mostly consisted of people within my same social class, the town itself has many neighborhoods consisting of people living in poverty.…