High School Family Centers: Transformative Spaces Linking Schools and Families in Support of Student Learning

ABSTRACT

This study explores school, family, and community partnership at the high school level, using eight family centers as the entry point for the investigation. The purpose of the study was to identify ways that parents and school staff could collaborate to support high school students' achievement. The study findings led to the development of a model that represents three inputs that are crucial to the creation of a successful family center: (1) a supportive infrastructure, (2) the existence of skilled center staff, and (3) the presence of responsive programming. These three inputs led to the creation of a thriving center that acts as a transformative space, a “zone of community,” that results in four outputs: (1) the creation of relational trust among adults, (2) shift in parents' role construction and efficacy, (3) the generation of student relational trust, and (4) the development of student efficacy. The data from this study suggest that the relational trust developed in these transformative spaces called family centers can have a positive effect on student efficacy. The study concludes with seven recommendations for schools and districts looking to establish family centers in high schools as a way to expand family engagement at the high school level.     

Probability of living through a period of economic instability

Welfare Based on Assets, a Way to Smooth Out Economic Instability and Develop Children's Human Capital is a four-part series of reports that focuses on the relationship between economic instability (i.e., income shocks, asset shocks, home loss, and asset poverty) and children's human capital development. Collectively, these reports build on the compelling observation that the pattern low-income families walk into is a present time oriented or consumption based pattern of behavior; in contrast, the pattern higher income families walk into is future oriented or asset based. In this first paper we find that between 2005 and 2009 the probability of a low-income child living through an income shock is between 43% (major shock) and 55% (minor shock). In contrast, the chance of a high-income child experiencing an income shock is between 6% (major shock) and 15% (minor shock) during the same period. We also find that the probability that a child will experience a net worth asset shock close to doubles for a child living in a black or low-income family between 2005 and 2009 when compared to 2000 and 2004. Policy implications are discussed.     

Accumulating assets,debts in young adulthood: Children as potential future investors

Child Development Accounts (CDA) aim to open savings accounts in childhood as a way to lay a foundation for building assets in young adulthood and beyond. Mainstream banks may be key partners in opening the accounts in which children can build assets. While children may have limited savings to invest initially, they may increasingly invest over time by accumulating assets and debts through mainstream banks. Mainstream banks may benefit from children's increasing investments. This paper uses propensity score weighted, longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and its supplements to examine savings, assets, debt, and net worth accumulation of young adults and whether or not they accumulate more when they have savings accounts as children. Young adults accumulate a median of $1000 in savings accounts, $4600 in total assets, $965 in debt (excluding student loans), and $4000 in net worth (excluding student loans). Young adults accumulate more savings and total assets when they have savings accounts as children. They accumulate less debt and more net worth when their households accumulate high net worth.     

‘The Girl About Town’: discussions of modernity and female youth in Drum magazine, 1951–1970

This article examines the trope of the ‘modern miss’ in Drum magazine 1951–1970 as a locus for debate over South African urban modernity. At the centre of Drum’s African urbanity was a debate between a progressive, positively ‘modern’ existence and an attendant fear of moral and social ‘breakdown’ in the apartheid city. The trope of the ‘modern miss’ drew upon both discourses. Drum’s fascination with the ‘modern miss’ reached a peak in the years 1957–1963, during which time she appeared prominently in the magazine as a symbolic pioneer of changing gender and generational relationships. However, this portrayal continued to coexist alongside the image of young women as the victims of moral degeneration. The ‘modern miss’ was increasingly differentiated from adult women within Drum’s pages, which distanced her from the new space won by political activists. By examining constructions of young womanhood, this article points to the gendering of ‘youth’ at the intersection of commercial print culture and shifting social relations in mid‐twentieth‐century South Africa. It is also suggested that understanding the social configurations of Drum’s modernity illuminates the gendered and generational responses of formal political movements as they conducted their own concurrent debates.     

Resource Accessibility and Walkability Among Older Adults in Extended-Stay Hotels

Older adults represent a large and growing population group in the United States. This population cohort is projected to grow to 72.1 million, or 19% of the total population, by 2030, up from 40 million in 2010 (Administration on Aging, 2011; Federal Interagency Forum on Aging-Related Statistics, 2012). Despite reported decreases in the proportion of older adults living in poverty in recent years, inequities prevail. Approximately 40% of older American households reported housing cost burdens¹Cost burdens are expenditures on housing and utilities that exceed 30% of household income. (Federal Interagency Forum on Aging-Related Statistics, 2012). Many of these low-income older adults live in socially and economically marginalized positions, and housing them remains a major challenge complicated by (a) limited affordable housing options and (b) chronic health conditions that seriously undermine long-term health and mobility. In a study on the impacts of public housing transformation in Atlanta, Oakley, Reid, & Ruel (2011) reported that 26% of seniors entered public housing because of a health condition or disability. According to Smith (2006), seniors in public housing are in worse health than other older Americans, even other poor older Americans suffering from such chronic health conditions as hypertension, diabetes, arthritis, and asthma. Despite these realities, Ball (2012) has noted that older adults receive little attention in comprehensive development planning beyond specialized age-segregated retirement and care communities. Salkin (2009) echoes similar concerns about the tendency toward housing initiatives and designs for more affluent older adults. She commented that most states have focused attention on programs that are best suited for seniors who do not have the same income limitations as those who are truly on fixed incomes and living close to the poverty level (Salkin, 2009). While public housing remains the predominant affordable housing option for low-income older adults, such housing is out of reach for many low-income older adults who find themselves displaced and homeless. As a result, some of these adults move into extended-stay hotels to remain sheltered.     

A CROSS-CULTURAL INVESTIGATION OF FACTORS INFLUENCING ENVIRONMENTAL ACTIONS

This article investigates contextual and individual factors influencing environmental behaviors for the 26 countries included in the 2000 International Social Survey Programme (ISSP). Individuals in countries with better environmental quality tend to have slightly more environmental involvement, but this relationship is mediated by economic circumstances, which have a greater independent impact on environmental actions. Respondents living in wealthier countries, no matter the environmental quality, more frequently join environmental groups, sign petitions concerning the environment, and give money for environmental causes.     

USING GENDER: THE PERSONAL,INTERPERSONAL, AND EMOTIONAL STRATEGIES OF DOMESTIC LABOR

Traditional research on domestic labor has conceptualized work done in support of the home as one of the quintessential ways of “doing” gender. New directions in gender and ritual theory raise the possibility that domestic labor may also be about strategy, usefulness and intentions. Through interviews with 24 married couples, I explore the subjective experiences of men and women as they “do” their domestic labor. I find that while husbands and wives are continuing to do gender as a response to interactional accountability demands, they also “use” domestic labor as a vehicle through which they (1) reciprocally craft their gender identity, (2) symbolically communicate with their spouse, and (3) garner emotional energy. Furthermore, the men and women strategically mobilized specific tasks that are most useful in achieving these goals inside their unique dyadic schemas. Through these narratives, I explore the possibility that men and women not only do gender but they can use gender as well.     

Understanding factors related to nonsmoking intention among college students

Abstract

Objective: While cigarette smoking in the United States has declined, the age range of smoking initiation has risen to include young adults. This study investigated the relationship of Theory of Planned Behavior constructs (TPB; attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control [PBC]) to nonsmoking intention among college students. Participants: Participants were 619 students at a Southeastern US university (69.8% female, 70.8% ≤ age 21, and 73.5% white). Methods: Students were recruited by email in March 2013 to participate in an online TPB-based questionnaire. Results: Future-oriented attitudes and PBC predicted higher nonsmoking intention; subjective norms did not. Moderator analyses indicated injunctive norms were more influential for occasional smokers and PBC was less influential. Conclusions: Findings suggest TPB is useful in predicting nonsmoking intention, but differentially for nonsmokers and occasional smokers. Future work should consider the health-related utility of future-oriented attitudes toward nonhealth domains and the differing beliefs of occasional smokers.