{"id":2236,"date":"2020-06-09T13:22:44","date_gmt":"2020-06-09T18:22:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/?p=2236"},"modified":"2020-06-09T13:22:44","modified_gmt":"2020-06-09T18:22:44","slug":"uber-rich-parents-and-their-fixers-may-be-just-the-tip-of-the-iceberg-turns-out-its-hard-for-teachers-to-resist-pushy-parents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/2020\/06\/09\/uber-rich-parents-and-their-fixers-may-be-just-the-tip-of-the-iceberg-turns-out-its-hard-for-teachers-to-resist-pushy-parents\/","title":{"rendered":"Uber-rich parents and their fixers may be just the tip of the iceberg. Turns out it\u2019s hard for teachers to resist pushy parents."},"content":{"rendered":"

Most Americans applaud the\u00a0<\/i>prison sentences<\/i><\/a>\u00a0given college admissions scandal parents like actor Felicity Huffman and \u201cfixers\u201d like tennis coach Michael Center for manipulating outrageous claims and exorbitant \u201cdonations\u201d to get coveted college admissions for unqualified students. A\u00a0<\/i>new study<\/i><\/a>\u00a0hints that similar kinds of pressures start early,\u00a0\u00a0are widespread, and are difficult for well-meaning educators to resist.<\/b><\/i><\/p>\n

Last year\u2019s college admissions scandal was shocking. But in a briefing report released by the Council on Contemporary Families<\/a>, Indiana University\u2019s Associate Professor\u00a0Jessica McCrory Calarco shows that the roots of such excesses can be traced back to parent-teacher dynamics that are evident as early as elementary school. While not focusing on such extremes, Calarco\u2019s report,\u00a0When \u201cHelicopters\u201d Go to School: Who Gets Rescued and Who Gets Left Behind?<\/b><\/a>,<\/b>\u00a0documents problems in ordinary elementary schools that\u00a0carry the seeds of future abuses.\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Teachers and schools rely on helper\u00a0<\/i>helicopter parents<\/i><\/a>.\u00a0<\/i>In a three-year study, Calarco\u00a0spent approximately 500 hours observing at a suburban elementary school, and interviewed 21 students, 24 parents, and 14 teachers and administrators. She documented\u00a0how educators, trying to supplement unequal and inadequate resources for high-quality education, come to rely on a set of privileged helicopter parents who contribute substantial amounts of time and money to the school. These parental volunteers allow schools to offer enrichment activities and supplemental staffing they could not otherwise afford.<\/p>\n

Some teachers are deferential, others just feel obligated to bend for these helper helicopters.\u00a0<\/i>Calarco shows how teachers\u2019 and administrators\u2019 dependence on these parents makes them yield to those who expect their children to receive special consideration as payback for the time and money they contribute. Some teachers willingly bend rules for these kids, reasoning that children whose parents don’t or can’t be highly involved in their education haven\u2019t \u201cearned\u201d special consideration. Others, Calarco shows, feel compelled to violate their sense of what is fair and best for the students\u2019 own development.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t kid yourself: It isn\u2019t the children of helicopter parents who suffer, it is the other students who are harmed.\u00a0<\/i>Most criticisms of helicopter parenting focus on how such parents hurt their own children by their over-protection and coddling. However, Calarco shows that the kids who actually get hurt by this are\u00a0not<\/i>\u00a0the ones who gain an edge in their school records and college applications but the ones who don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

It is easy to blame ambitious, over-engaged moms, but helicopter parents aren\u2019t so much a cause of inequality as a consequence.\u00a0<\/i>For the past forty years, economic inequality has grown: Benefits of economic growth have been gobbled up by the top ten percent, and the bottom half of the population has seen wages stagnate while costs of schooling have soared. Over this time, the intensity of parenting has increased\u2014and parents with more resources are spending those on their children at an accelerating rate.<\/p>\n

The policy recommendations aren\u2019t complex.<\/i>\u00a0\u201c<\/b>Adequate and\u00a0equitably distributed<\/a>\u00a0school funding (particularly if coupled with\u00a0redistribution of funds<\/a>\u00a0raised by Parent-Teacher Organizations) has the potential to reduce schools\u2019 dependence on higher-SES \u2018helicopter\u2019 parents,\u201d Calarco writes. In America we have a deep belief that education leads to social change. This work shows such change\u00a0could<\/i>\u00a0be towards equity, but has instead been towards growing, persistent inequality that leaves some children and their parents stymied in school and beyond. These inequalities exacerbate the unresolved racial and ethnic disparities that plague our education systems.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s perfectly natural to want your kids to do the best they can,\u201d\u00a0Stephanie Coontz, CCF Director of Research, notes.\u201cBut in\u00a0societies with high levels of economic inequality<\/a>, parents often want them to do\u00a0better<\/i> than everyone else. And when schools are unequally funded and must rely on parents\u2019 contributions of time and money, it creates patterns of entitlement and exclusion that pave the way for the abuses we have seen in the college admission scandals.\u201d<\/p>\n

FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT:\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

Jessica McCrory Calarco<\/b>,<\/i>\u00a0Associate Professor of Sociology at Indiana University,\u00a0www.jessicacalarco<\/a>;\u00a0jcalarco@iu.edu<\/a>;\u00a0Professor Calarco is author of\u00a0Negotiating Opportunities: How the Middle Class Secures Advantages in School<\/i><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Most Americans applaud the\u00a0prison sentences\u00a0given college admissions scandal parents like actor Felicity Huffman and \u201cfixers\u201d like tennis coach Michael Center for manipulating outrageous claims and exorbitant \u201cdonations\u201d to get coveted college admissions for unqualified students. A\u00a0new study\u00a0hints that similar kinds of pressures start early,\u00a0\u00a0are widespread, and are difficult for well-meaning educators to resist. Last year\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2095,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38846],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-heard-around-ccf"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2095"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2236"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2292,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2236\/revisions\/2292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}