A Framework for Understanding Poverty (10 page)

GENERATIONAL POVERTY

One of the reasons it is getting more and more difficult to conduct school as we have in the past is that the students who bring the middle-class culture with them are decreasing in numbers, and the students who bring the poverty culture with them are increasing in numbers. As in any demographic switch, the prevailing rules and policies eventually give way to the group with the largest numbers.

In order to better serve these students, the next several chapters have ideas about ways in which we can work with students and adults. But to do so, we must fundamentally rethink the notions we have traditionally assigned to relationships and achievement.

WHAT DOES THIS INFORMATION MEAN IN THE SCHOOL OR WORK SETTING?

? An education is the key to getting out of, and staying out of, generational poverty. Individuals leave poverty for one of four reasons: a goal or vision of something they want to be or have; a situation that is so painful that anything would be better; someone who "sponsors" them (i.e., an educator or spouse or mentor or role model who shows them a different way or convinces them that they could live differently); or a specific talent or ability that provides an opportunity for them.

? Being in poverty is rarely about a lack of intelligence or ability.

? Many individuals stay in poverty because they don't know there is a choice-and if they do know that, have no one to teach them hidden rules or provide resources.

? Schools are virtually the only places where students can learn the choices and rules of the middle class.

The culture of poverty has some universal characteristics which transcend regional, rural-urban, and even national differences ... There are remarkable similarities in family structure, interpersonal relations, time orientations, value systems, spending patterns, and the sense of community in lower-class settlements in London, Glasgow, Paris, Harlem, and Mexico City.

- Oscar Lewis, Four Horsemen

CHAPTER 5

Role Models and
Emotional Resources

o understand the importance of role models and their part in the development of emotional resources, one must first briefly look at the notion of functional and dysfunctional systems. The following definitions will be used:

A SYSTEM is a group in which individuals have rules, roles, and relationships.

DYSFUNCTIONAL is the extent to which on individual cannot get his/her needs met within a system.

All systems are, to some extent, dysfunctional. A system is not equally functional or dysfunctional for each individual within a given system. The extent to which an individual must give up meeting his/her needs in order to meet the needs of another person is the extent to which the situation is dysfunctional.

Michael Dumont (1994) gives a case study of a girl named Ellie.

ELLIE

Ellie's mother, Victoria, is bedridden with multiple sclerosis and her father, Larry, is a small storekeeper. Victoria, in her rage at the disease and her distrust of Larry, attempts suicide when Ellie is 9 years old. It is Ellie's job each day when she comes home from school to count her mother's pills to make certain they are all there-and to check to see if her mother is alive. Ellie tells Mr. Dumont that the worst part of her day is when she comes home from school and must check on her mother's well-being. When he tells Ellie that she is smart and asks her what she wants to be, she tells him she would like to be a secretary. At 13 Ellie becomes pregnant and drops out of school.

The situation is dysfunctional for Ellie because she must sublimate her needs to address the needs of her mother. In order for Ellie to have an appropriate developmental process emotionally, she needs to be a child, then an adolescent, then an adult. By being forced to take on an adult role earlier, she must in essence put her emotional development on hold while she functions in an adult role. Therefore, for the rest of her life, Ellie will seek to have her emotional needs met that were not met during her childhood. She almost certainly will not have the emotional resources and stamina necessary to function as an interdependent adult.

DEPENDENCE

INDEPENDENCE

INTERDEPENDENCE

To become a fully functioning adult, one moves developmentally from being dependent to being independent to being interdependent. Stephen Covey (1989) calls it the maturity continuum, and John Bradshaw (1988) refers to it as becoming whole. Regardless of the terminology, it basically means moving from being dependent on others to being able to work together with other adults, each independent of the other, but jointly, as equal partners.

Simply put, an individual operating in a dysfunctional setting is often forced to take an adult role early, and then as an adult, is literally caught between being dependent and independent. So one will see this fierce independence coupled with a crippling dependence that weakens the person to the point that he/she has few emotional resources. This roller-coaster ride up and down between dependence and independence takes a heavy toll. Bradshaw and others refer to this constant fluctuation between dependence and independence as co-dependency.

As Ellie's case study illustrates, the emotional resources come in part from the role models who are present for the child. When the appropriate role models are present, the child can go through the developmental stages at appropriate times and build emotional resources. Emotional resources are built in this fashion: The child watches the adult for emotional responses to a given situation and notes the continuum of behaviors that go with those responses. In Ellie's situation, her mother's response to her husband's infidelity was to create an even greater level of dependence-and to use the emotional ploy of guilt to manipulate Ellie. So what does Ellie do when she gets old enough? She creates a level of dependence on others as well (i.e., through pregnancy and going on welfare).

A child may decide that the role-model responses are not appropriate. Often what occurs then is that the child selects the opposite extreme from which to operate. What is problematic for the child is simply what is "normal"; an appropriate adult response is rarely observable. The child, therefore, is forced to guess at what "normal" or appropriate is.

Question: Why would emotional resouces have such importance in school and at work?

Answer: Emotional responses dictate behavior and, eventually, determine achievement.

Futhermore, in order to move from poverty to middle class or from middle class to wealth, one must trade off some relationships for achievement at least for a period of time. To do this, one needs emotional resources and stamina.

An emotional memory bank is defined as the emotions that are accessed habitually and "feel right." When a relationship is traded off for achievement, the emotional memory bank must be held in abeyance until the new "feel right" feeling can be obtained. That process sometimes take years. The driving force behind an individual holding the emotional memory bank in abeyance is usually one of four things: (1) The current situation is too painful for the individual to stay, (2) a compelling goal or vision of the future drives the individual, (3) a talent or skill takes the individual into new surroundings, or (4) a spouse or mentor provides an emotional comfort level while the individual learns the new skills/knowledge.

Emotional resources and stamina allow the individual to live with feelings other than those in the emotional memory bank. This allowance provides the individual the opportunity to seek options and examine other possibilities. As the case study shows, Ellie stays with her emotional memory bank and creates situations that "feel right."

HOW DO YOU PROVIDE EMOTIONAL RESOURCES WHEN THE STUDENT HAS NOT HAD ACCESS TO APPROPRIATE ROLE MODELS?

i. Through support systems.

2. By using appropriate discipline strategies and approaches.

3. By establishing long-term relationships (apprenticeships, mentorships) with adults who are appropriate.

4. By teaching the hidden rules.

5. By identifying options.

6. By increasing individuals' achievement level through appropriate instruction.

7. By teaching goal-setting.

WHAT DOES THIS INFORMATION MEAN IN THE SCHOOL OR WORK SETTING?

a Schools need to establish schedules and instructional arrangements that allow students to stay with the same teachers for two or more years-if mutually agreed upon.

w Teachers and administrators are much more important as role models than has previously been addressed.

? The development of emotional resources is crucial to student success. The greatest free resource available to schools is the rolemodeling provided by teachers, administrators, and staff.

CHAPTER 6

Support Systems

upport systems are the friends, family, and backup resources that can be accessed in times of need. These systems of support tend to fall into seven Jgeneral categories.

1. Coping Strategies

Coping strategies are the ways in which one copes with daily living: the disappointments, the tragedies, the triumphs. Coping strategies are ways to think about things, attitudes, self-talk, strategies for resolving conflicts, problem-solving techniques, and the avoidance of needless conflicts. Coping strategies are also ways of approaching tasks, setting priorities, and determining what one can live with and what one can live without.

2. Options During Problem-Solving

Options are all the ways to solve a problem. Even very capable adults often talk over a problem with another adult just in order to see other options they haven't considered.