Children born into poverty in the United States are at greater risk for a number of negative outcomes, including high school drop-out, teen pregnancy, drug use, and exposure to crime. Despite the negative statistics, many poor children advance socioeconomic status by adulthood. Although there is an extensive body of research identifying the causes and consequences of poverty, there is much less on socioeconomic advancement. The current study argues that in the absence of this latter group, the analysis of poverty, and particularly how to help more people advance out of poverty, is incomplete. Through life-history interviews this study considers the educational trajectories of 52 first-generation college students, half of whom were still in college and half had graduated and had middle-class earnings at the time of their research interviews. Respondents qualified for the study if they were the first in their family to attend a four-year college and had qualified for any form of governmental public assistance as children. The middle-class cohort additionally had to be earning a minimum of $34,000 annually. This study adds to the literature by identifying the relationships, events, and other factors that facilitated respondents' advancement in socioeconomic status. Additionally, it considers the durability of the narrative of the American Dream and its impact on poverty policy, arguing that an accurate detailing of the structures of inequality at earlier levels of education than are currently in place is necessary to move society in the direction of poverty policy that would effectively address American inequality / acase@tulane.edu
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TULANE/oai:http://digitallibrary.tulane.edu/:tulane_24128 |
| Date | January 2009 |
| Contributors | Abelev, Melissa S (Author), Devine, Joel A (Thesis advisor) |
| Publisher | Tulane University |
| Source Sets | Tulane University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | Access requires a license to the Dissertations and Theses (ProQuest) database., Copyright is in accordance with U.S. Copyright law |
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