Poverty's Effects on Education by Sarah Periaswamy

Poverty is a huge issue worldwide, and it can affect many different things. Poverty can affect the type of education a child receives as well as the extracurricular activities a child is involved in. If a family cannot afford to live in a good area, the school district is most likely not going to be great either. If a family does not have enough money for rent and food, a child will most likely not be able to be a part of extracurricular activities because they can be very expensive. These aspects all effect a child’s cognitive development and wellbeing.

            According to Eccles and Templeton (2002), the Carnegie Corporation made the point that children have a lot of free time on their hands, and if they are not kept busy, they are more likely to engage in troublesome behavior. They also made the point that by being a part of extracurricular activity, a child can learn valuable social skills (Eccles&Templeton, 2002). Eccles and Templeton (2002) also did a study that had students classify themselves as “the brain, the jock, the princess, the criminal, and the basket case”, which were terms from the movie The Breakfast Club. They looked at how students classified themselves and also what they were involved in. According to the study, the students that had been involved in “team sports or school-spirit related clubs” actually had a higher had a higher academic standing than would have been predicted based on family background and previous testing, and tended to classify themselves as “the princess” or “the jock” (Eecles&Templeton, 2002). This study provides evidence that these activities help these children as they develop cognitively. The study also states the students who did well also had friends that had a high academic standing as well (Eccles&Templeton, 2002). So to some extent, the study also provides evidence that the cognitive ability gained from these activities also has an environmental factor as well.

            Another study that was done by Fisher (2014) looked at participation in extracurricular activities and motivation. Fisher (2014) hypothesized that the effects of being a part of extracurricular activities were related on their connections to their schools. One of the conclusions that this study came to was that the effects of the activities depended on the quality of the activity (Fisher, 2014). So for poorer families that live in poorer areas, the extracurricular activities their children will be involved in will most likely not be high quality because these schools cannot afford it. While richer families are able to afford these schools and activities, it gives their children a better chance at developing social and intellectual skills.

            According to Kalat (2013) enhancement in certain skills can be due to physical activity, which was proven using a running wheel, which had enhanced growth of axons and dendrites in rats. It has been harder to prove this within humans, but it has been seen that working on a specific skill, can help enhance skills related to that one (Kalat, 2013). But even if extracurricular activities don’t help general cognitive development, it still helps development of certain skills, which children in poverty still miss out on if they cannot afford to be a part of these activities.

            Relating to poverty, these children that are raised in poor areas cannot afford to have a good education because their parents or families simply do not have the money for it. While it already being more likely that they are at a school that is not up to standard, they also lose out on another way to develop certain specific skills by not being able to be a part of extracurricular activities. This just continues the cycle of poverty: someone with a lower education has a harder time finding a career, and therefore has a harder time providing for their family. This further puts a separation in between the wealthy and the poor. The wealthy can afford to keep their kids in a higher standard of education and keep them in these activities that help them develop cognitively. The poor families can’t afford it therefore, it gives those children less of a chance to have a better education or develop cognitively through these activities. And as the cycle continues, the poorer just get poorer and the richer just get richer, continuing to widen the divide between these classes.

References

Eccles, J. S., & Templeton, J. ( 2002). Extracurricular and other after-school activities for youth. Review of Research in Education, 26, 113– 180. doi: 10.3102/0091732X026001113

Fischer, N., & Theis, D. (2014). Extracurricular participation and the development of school attachment and learning goal orientation: The impact of school quality. Developmental Psychology, 50(6), 1788-1793. doi:10.1037/a0036705

Kalat, J. (2013). Biological psychology (11th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning.