PARENTAL INCOME AS A FACTOR AFFECTING A CHILD’S ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE. A PAPER PRESENTED AT OPINIONS FROM AFRICA RESEARCH DEPARTMENT’S (#ResearchwithPet) ONLINE CONFERENCE ON THE THEME PARENTAL FACTORS AFFECTING CHILD’S ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE. HOST- JIDECHUKWU ANGELA NWABUEZE.
By Chidinma Mary Orjiakor
Monday June 15, 2020
What is Parental income?
Parental income concerns itself more on the ability of parents to provide necessary facilities or materials that can help in making the learning of school subjects easy for students
At this point, some might ask if it really means that all students whose parents earn little income perform poorly in school and does it equally mean that all students whose parents earn high income perform well academically? Quite a tricky question playing tricks on our minds… The truth is that not all those whose parents are low income earners perform poorly in school and not all those whose parents are rich perform well academically. However, this does not dispute the fact that parents’ lack of finance can be a setback for students because students need finance to carry out most of their school activities such as buying of textbooks, transportation to school, getting snacks during break times, payment of dues etc. Parents equally need money to pay for their children’s school fees, get new school uniform for their children, and other financial aspect of a child’s education.
They say money is the root of all evil but not being able to cater for the needs of your child but in school and at home is something we should never wish for. It’s actually an indirect form of childhood maltreatment.
Here, let me tell a story to portray my points: -Dancing through the memory lane of my childhood, I remembered that I sat by my mother’s bean cake (akara) stall waiting for my share of bean cake and pap for breakfast before I could go to school. As I sat to eat, I always looked out for rich men/women who bring their children in their cars, to a school so close to my mum’s akara stall. I remembered clearly that I looked out for their children who always sat comfortably at either the back or front seat of their dad’s or mum’s car in a pose that made me wish my dad or mum had a car so they could drive me to school too. I would stop eating so as to admire their well ironed uniform and their well packed lunch box with apple by the side. They equally wore neat socks, and well polished black leather shoe. I wouldn’t lie, the appearance of these rich kids intimidated me though as a child then, I might not have felt it physically but psychologically. I would look at my poor self, my neat but patched uniform. I even wore my sandal with no socks and I wasn’t so bothered ‘cos my teacher never bothered to ask about that too. I had no school bag, but a black polythene bag, with just two exercise books as my parents couldn’t afford textbooks. In fact textbooks were not compulsory, because it was a public Muslim school where all the subjects were taught in Hausa including English. Worst still, we had no library.
I remembered I once wished the family could adopt me ‘cos as a child I was intelligent and I loved school but my parents were not financially stable to enroll me in a better school that would impact me. I wanted to eat healthy meals, speak better English, have my own text books, do home lessons, and have my teacher come to class regularly to teach us. But these wouldn’t happen ‘cos my parents earn as little as you can imagine and the only option of education for I and my siblings was enrolling in a government primary school in our area where education was free. Free but not adequate for learning. I finally did have my prayers answered ‘cos my aunty in Lagos later asked me to come stay with her when things became kinda difficult but imagine repeating primary 2 to 6 when I was meant to be in JSS 1 ‘cos I couldn’t measure up to schools over there. Well, the rest is history.
From the story above, you could imagine the impact of parental income on a child’s academic performance. The lack of finance by the child’s parents in the story above subjected him/her to psychological or emotional trauma which might have led to lack of concentration in class, depression and so on and so forth.
Equally from my personal experience, students from poor families do not only receive the worst education but they fall victims to lifestyle and health issues that hinder their ability to learn. While we often assume that learning is up to each individual and that kids who put in the most effort tends to learn more, the reality says otherwise.
Here let’s look at how low income of a child’s parent impacts on the education of their children.
1) Reduced verbal and Reasoning skills of a child
A child whose parents are low income earners tend to have lower level of verbal and reasoning skill than kids from high income family because their parents are less likely to read to them. With longer working hours, lower levels of education, and fewer literary resources, low income parents are unable to give their kids the same level of attention and thus their children learn a much limited vocabulary. A study done in 1995 found that poor children had heard 32 million fewer words than the higher income family while starting school.
2) Nutrition and cognitive development
Low income families are less likely to be able to afford proper nutrition and sometimes simply don’t have enough food at home. With little financial education, debt and low earning, low income parents might send their kids to school without breakfast or lunch. Unlike high income family who make sure their kids eats meals that are balanced and help develop the cognitive and other aspects of their kids, low income parents give food for necessity, because they can’t afford a balanced meal. This can lead to a gap in learning for both families.
A 2008 study shows that not eating enough can reduce the brain capacity quickly and poor students quickly end up falling behind their classmates. They hardly pay attention, and are easily tired.
3) Impaired development due to stress
Children’s brain develops best when they have low exposure to stress in their home. However, low income can create a series of emergency that triggers stress hormones. These hormones have a dampening effect on brain development which can result in an inability to pay attention, regulate emotions or develop proper memory function. From personal observations, students whose parents earn high income have less stress because they are not exposed to stress in their homes. They have workers such as maids, cleaners, nanny etc. They have time to read, sleep and play, while students whose parents earn little or low income might either go to help their mother in their business or even hawk to provide extra income after school. Thus, students whose parents earn little have little or no time to read and go through their school work.
4) Bad school conditions
When a school is in need of repair, lacks books and other resources and has a hard time retaining teachers, students are negatively impacted. Unlike children whose parents are low earner earners, children whose parents are high income earners attend schools that has most of all the resources needed to build a child despite their learning disability.
5) Availability of resources, such as books, material, transportation
Most high income parents can afford most of the resources needed by both the school and their children. They equally provide means of transportation or pay for it. However, low income parents barely can afford resources needed by their children in school. Most of their kids walk miles to school and they often arrive school looking tired and sleepy during lesson. Most of them are chased out during fees collection. They don’t own books or textbooks of their own, and few are opportune to use the library. What then do you expect from a child in this category?
Nevertheless, though low income of parents create a huge void in their child’s education while high income parents provides opportunity for their kids to explore and create, there is no guarantee that kids from low income family don’t perform well in schools. As a matter of fact most of them do well. In a world that is unequal. There is still probability that the children whose parents are high income earners won’t still perform well despite all that was provided for him or her to excel. It all depends on their learning ability and disability.
POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS THE PROBLEMS
1) countries , state, localities, should offer free parenting workshops in person and online to help parents give their kids a better start.
2) Funding of special Educational programs for all disadvantaged and kids of low income earners to help close the learning gaps.
3) Federal funding of public schools, donations from individuals or NGos to fund and provide resources for kids.
4) schools should educate children about careers and what it takes to succeed on the jobs, this will help the kids aim higher.
CONCLUSION
Let me leave you with this- If the society was better, we won’t have disadvantaged, poor, disabled, or neglected kids around us. It is not their fault but the situation they were born into. As humans, we could encourage children whose parents are low income earners by encouraging them, making them laugh, by not victimizing them in class, home or in front of others, offering extra class. Most importantly, try to find out their learning disability, as well as the type of learners they are and help them build a learning exercise
