School co-ethnicity and Hispanic parental involvement

Scholars of immigration disagree about the role ethnic communities play in immigrant families’ engagement in educational institutions. While some researchers argue that the concentration of disadvantaged ethnic groups may prevent meaningful engagement with schools, others argue that ethnic communities can possess resources that help immigrant families be involved in their children’s schooling. In this study we use a nationally representative dataset of Hispanic children from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K) to determine if the relative size of the Hispanic population in the school affects levels of their parents’ involvement in their education, as well as parents’ perceptions of barriers to their involvement. Our results suggest that a large Hispanic presence in a child’s school can help increase immigrant Hispanic parents’ involvement in their children’s schooling, but there are no benefits for US-born Hispanic parents, indicating that ethnic communities help immigrant families acculturate to American institutions.     

Cultivating Professional Allies for Sexual Minority Youth: A Community-Based Educational Intervention

Sexual minority youth (SMY) face multiple risks in their daily lives that may influence their need for supportive care. Health and social service providers have unique opportunities to provide culturally competent services to these youth. This article describes a community-based educational intervention created to increase providers’ knowledge, skills, and intention to support SMY. Based on the Information-Motivation-Behavioral Skills model, this pilot study found that for a diverse sample of multidisciplinary professionals (n = 2,850), the odds of behavioral intention (BI) to support SMY were significantly higher when trainings were relevant to the professionals’ experience (OR = 1.3), were sensitive (OR = 1.3), developed skills (OR = 1.1), and incorporated policy (OR = 1.2). Implications for the delivery of community-based trainings are provided.     

A Typology of Dual Earner Marriages Based on Work and Family Arrangements

Qualitative research has investigated distinct couple types that divide work and family responsibilities based on employment circumstances and relationship characteristics, but such research is not conducive to identifying frequencies of couple types or statistically comparing work-family circumstances across couple types. The current study incorporated both employment and family variables in identifying four distinct dual-earner couple types among respondents from the National Survey of the Changing Workforce. Couple types were compared regarding demographic information, and memberships in couple types were predicted based on this information. Some significant differences emerged that may begin to explain the circumstances and motivations behind selecting certain work-family arrangements, though the more peer-like couples were less distinct and in some ways less economically advantaged than expected.

RELATIONSHIP TRANSITIONS AMONG YOUTH IN URBAN KENYA

The process of courtship and marriage in sub-Saharan Africa has changed remarkably. These changes, however, have received scant attention, as recent research has focused on adolescent relationships' links to HIV/AIDS rather than to marriage. Drawing on detailed reports of 1,365 romantic and sexual partnerships from youths in Kisumu, Kenya, we find that marital aspirations, school enrollment, emotional attraction, pregnancy, and independence from kin are all predictors of getting engaged or married. Furthermore, though men and women are much more likely to marry partners they believe are sexually exclusive, men who have multiple partners are actually more likely to get married. By focusing on the contemporary process of marriage, this paper offers an alternative portrayal of premarital relationships in sub-Saharan Africa.     

Attachment to Community and Civic and Political Engagement: A Case Study of Students

Youth's low level of civic and political engagement may detrimentally affect the health of communities and the democratic system. This paper examines the role of community attachment in explaining youth's levels of civic and engagement. This examination requires an evaluation of existing measures of community attachment and their relevance for understanding youth's experiences. The paper uses a student sample, highlighting a group of youth who have a degree of variation in their experiences of community attachment. We find that subjective measures of community attachment are related to volunteering and voting, but the objective measure of community attachment, that is, years of residence, affects voting and not volunteering. Different mechanisms explain civic engagement versus political engagement. As such, different strategies are required to combat low levels of civic versus political engagement. Le manque d'engagement civique et politique de la jeunesse peut avoir un effet néfaste sur la santé des communautés et sur le système démocratique. Cet article examine le rôle de l'appartenance communautaire pour expliquer le niveau de participation civique et politique des jeunes. Cette recherche nécessite une évaluation des mesures existantes de l'appartenance à une communauté et de leur pertinence pour la compréhension des expériences des jeunes. Cet article se base sur un groupe d'étudiants pour illustrer une population de jeunes avec un niveau d'attachement communautaire variable. Nous avons remarqué que les mesures subjectives de l'attachement à la communauté sont liées au bénévolat et au vote, alors que les mesures objectives de l'attachement, comme la durée de résidence, affecte le vote et non le bénévolat. De différents processus peuvent expliquer l'engagement civique par rapport à l'engagement politique. Ainsi, des stratégies différentes sont nécessaires pour lutter contre la faiblesse des niveaux de participation civique et politique.     

NEGOTIATING DIFFERENCE:

Research on immigrant women workers in the United States and Third World women employed by multinational corporations in export-enclaves has highlighted how global movements of capital and labor are expressed in changing labor processes, working conditions, and ethnic relations in the workplace. Notably absent from this body of literature are the ways in which rural, white American women respond to the new work environments offered by direct foreign investments in the United States. Using in-depth interviews with workers and observations of the workplace and the community we explore how the Japanese purchase of an apparel manufacturing firm in upstate New York reconstituted factory floor relations. In so doing, we extend interpretations of the social construction of the labor process by recognizing the racialized and ethnicized character of rural white women. We also show how both workers and managers construct stereotypic expectations of the other that are manipulated on the shop floor in the struggle for control, recognition, and appreciation.     

Building Community from Scratch: Forces at Work among Urban Vietnamese Refugees in Milwaukee

Drawing from extensive participant observation and qualitative interviewing, this paper describes and analyzes the Vietnamese community in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The author concludes that community, both as an element that is sensed by its members and a process identified by actual interaction, is virtually nonexistent. Ten specific forces that inhibit community formation are identified under the overlapping categories of demographics, organizational issues, cultural factors, and class/power interests. The underlying tendencies toward family isolationism and radical individualism are implicated as driving social forces that undermine community building. Lessons learned from this case study about the process of community formation include the insufficiency of a common enemy or ethnic identity for sustainable community, social psychological issues, and environmental influences, as well as survival needs.     

Organizational Identity and Philanthropic Institutions

This article proposes a framework for viewing the behavior of philanthropic institutions through the lens of organizational identity via semi‐structured interviews with twenty‐seven grantmakers representing seventeen foundations, along with content analyses of these foundations’ public documents. This empirical investigation revealed three identity profiles: agenda setter, supporter, and community builder, which capture distinct patterns in foundation strategy, operational structure, and grantmaking practices. For theory, these findings provide an alternative to the conventional view of foundation behavior along an active to passive continuum to one that suggests a role for organizational identity. For practitioners (grantmakers and grantseekers), this perspective demonstrates that there are multiple pathways through which foundations create social value, not just one definition of “best practices.” Understanding these different perspectives on social value creation can help grantmakers identify internal inconsistencies in their strategies and operations and can help grantseekers identify foundations most likely to fund their work. The article concludes with suggestions for further research to explore the extent to which this framework can advance understanding of institutional philanthropy as the field moves to challenge traditional boundaries between nonprofit foundations and private social change initiatives.