To wonder why working class white boys do worse than any other ethnic group, and how we can change this?

I have worked in the UK, Ireland and ME. Parental aspiration is the key. Many of the working class black/brown families do not have houses full of educational toys and books that are often trotted out as being so important (and they are). They often do not go to libraries or day trips to NT houses or access other such cultural capital activities. What they do have are parents (or a parent) who offer them no option of not doing well. It is expected that they come home from school, do their homework, many also have supplementary religious activities that they attend daily too. There is no concept of children hanging around street corners because "our children have nothing else to do". Parents are the authority and children know this. They want to do well because they want to do better, but also they want to do their parents proud.

I think it’s a mixture of factors - decline in religious-driven moral standards, decline in marriage and decline of manufacturing and heavy industries.

Working class lads need to see what they’ll become as men and in the 70s and 80s that would’ve been an employed dad coming home for his tea and expecting his son to behave according to social norms. Or a Headmaster who was the authority of rules and discipline at school. Or a football coach who was matey, drank down the pub but expected lads to have their kit ready and play by the rules.

Boys had role models. They had routes to employment. They could grow up through healthy pursuits.

In my 15+ years of working with underprivileged children, I have found there to be less emphasis on schooling in Caucasian families. There seems to be an acceptance of poor performance at school rather than a fight against it. In ethnic families, I notice a reluctance to accept their children are failing academically and a push to achieve the basics at the very least. I notice as well at my children’s private school that amongst the ethnic families there are a lot of parents in normal jobs that sacrifice everything else to send their children to a private school whereas most of the Caucasian families generally have higher paid jobs/family finances and have to make less of a compromise. I speak generally as an overview, there are of course some that do not fit the above but generally that has been my experience.

Ucch this is my son 😫 we are really struggling with this at the moment. He doesn’t want a 9-5, doesn’t want to work for somebody else, doesn’t want to stay in school post 18. But seems to think he has some entitlement to being rich. Thankfully he’s still engaged in school (though not enjoying it) but honestly it’s stressing me out.

I bet social media has an impact on this. My daughter is definitely influenced by SM and only wants to do jobs that make her rich but doesn’t seem to connect that requires a lot of studying unless you get very lucky as an influencer.

This

White working class girls grades are declining too. Secondary education is failing so many young people. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce8lnpyg7nno?app-referrer=deep-link

That seems like a massive generalisation that white working class boys are rarely academic and further adds to the view that they can’t achieve so why bother trying. How depressing!

White working class girls results are deteriorating actually, and white working class boys slightly improving, due to targeted assistance. Poor girls; their needs neglected.

This is a very good Question, and I wish I had the full answer.
Working class boys are very rarely academic, so I think I would re open the trade schools, teach woodwork, metal work, technical drawing, teach them to drive. Then specialise in plumbing, carpentry, electrical engineering.
This would enable them to get jobs which pay well, often better than those requiring a degree- so they can have decent lives and support a family.
It benefits society too, as we would get a new generation of skilled tradesmen.

I don't think that arg8ument is supported by data from the USA. One study I saw some time ago rated Jamaican Americans as being higher earners than many other immigrant groups and well higher than local black Americans.

There are a lot of interesting potential reasons in this thread, but I wonder if an additional factor is the attitude of middle clsss boys is rubbing off on them, but like a lot of things the impact is worse of the most deprived.

We have a phenomenon called BULBS at. They are 'bright underachieving, lazy, boys'. ..they do enough to pass exams and get onto the next level of course and parents step in with tutors or ginding ghood next step option. they just think its cool to not try that hard and underachieve. The mainly come from working homes with parents who do white collar work.. But if a deprived person who already has a language gap, has less options for transport for next steps etc has that same attitude as those boys, the repercussions are worse.

This. No one is looking at raising standards in (economically, educationally or anything else) in our northern and eastern coastal communities for example.

You are incorrect.
Bangladeshi boys perform the worst and have for decades

Or increasingly, removing kids from school altogether in order to “homeschool” (ie spend eight hours a day gaming) for often spurious reasons which have more to do with the parents’ lack of organisation and motivation than the children. (Disclaimer: I am not talking about SEN children or those who have been bullied).

Absolutely
Children from immigrant families are told that they have to work twice as hard to achieve because of the possible racism they may encounter
When I was at university I used to tutor on the side . Many of my students were of West African or South Asian descent ( Indian and Pakistani heritage) .
A number of the Pakistani parents could not speak English but they would ensure that their children had tutoring in English, Maths and the sciences
When these self same students end up having high flying careers the working class white boys who didn’t even bother to turn up at school will claim that all the’ illegals’ have taken all the jobs and that the white working class are being ignored.

.

Also African countries tend to have strict and religious cultures, respect for elders etc. This would have been imported to the UK from Ghana, Nigeria etc. (This culture is declining from South Africa upwards as communities breakdown owing to urbanisation.)
British culture would have been similar before the industrial revolution - Very restrictive but more structured and kids more likely to do what they were told (in short). Then the communities were based around mines or factories or ports. As these communities then broke down, the problem worsened.
Removing structure, security and routine from entire communities does not end well.

Exactly

Parental involvement in an encouraging and supportive way. Not battling with the school and claiming that the reason for behaviour or lack of engagement is due to “pick a reason”.

@FairKoala

Your child might get to “read” a few pages of a book with a TA for 10 minutes per day but there is no concessions in the classrooms

Compare that with those of immigrant children and children whose parents don’t have English as a first language and these children get much more concessions and proper lessons separately to get them up to the level they need to be

What this analysis fails to see is that those new immigrants kids aren't hanging out after school. They go home, have to sweep the floors, clean the bathroom, wash and iron the clothes.

Then they have to sit down with their parents and translate any letters for them that have come through in the post, and help them with any banking/utilities tasks that need to be actioned.

Finally after that they have to do their homework - and do it well, as it is made clear that they carry the expectations of the family on their shoulders, as well as perhaps the financial longevity of the family.

They often live in a parallel universe to the white British WC children they sit next to at school - whose parents often complain to teachers that 5 minutes of maths homework per day is excessive. Parallel universes.

@PotolKimchi

White working class kids in the same system
are not told that at home. Their precarity is a result of economic deprivation. But they don’t feel like they don’t belong. They are told they are the core of the nation (and many white working class families were till industries and mines were decimated) so when they fail their community tells them it’s not their fault, it’s the system, it’s the elites and it’s the immigrants

This is a good summary. These kids and their attitudes are being manipulated by both right and left in the most cynical way.

@CinnamonJellyBeansforgive me if I’ve misread your post but so much of what you have written is bonkers. Was it meant to be tongue in cheek?

White heroes on the school curriculum being replaced? Shakespeare is on the GCSE English Literature curriculum. The World Wars are heavily taught in schools and both my dc learnt about Churchill. One even wrote a long biography piece about Churchill in Year 6 as his main homework project that term.

My dd is currently doing RE GCSE, half of which is Christianity. So heaps on Jesus and his teachings. Kids at primary school still learn about the birth of baby Jesus and the Easter story.

The curriculum you describe @CinnamonJellyBeansis not one I recognise after teaching for 20 years and raising my own dc.

Its interesting when it's white males that are underachieving our go to is to think how the environment could be better shaped around their needs, rather than how they might be supported to succeed within an existing environment, that is clearly working for other groups, isn't it?
There is nothing about being white or male that should predispose a child to greater challenges than other students. Obviously being socio economically disadvantaged will be a factor, but again, no reason being white and male should compound that, given neither are disadvantages.
We'd perhaps do better to examine the reasons other groups are succeeding and what is different about them, so we can encourage similar behaviours.
That said, I think a lack of perceived relevance in the curriculum doesn't help. When I was at school less academically inclined students were able to start practical and vocational courses at a young age and by 16 were typically the 'lad' in some sort of paid role.

I feel like we often talk about working class when we mean lower socio-economic class. And there are different issues with those.

Remember the documentary Swap Schools? It is now over 10 years old but private school students and teachers swap with state school students and teachers. The doc could be inproved quite a but but i do I remember the teachers saying that the main difference was parents involvement.

It’s striking seeing this on a thread which is literally about wwc lagging behind. If this is part of the reason, then it does rather suggest that nursing a grievance can be useful even when it’s clearly nonsense.

Definite tie to geography, the closures of heavy industry impacted more on men than women. The jobs, where there were any, which replaced them were likely to be admin, call centre, service industry which might have been more suited to skills traditionally regarded as female. STEM programs helped girls in to traditionally male academics fields where they generally succeeded and often overtook boys. Even school starting age is a factor, girls mature faster than boys in some aspects but they start at the same age and sit exams at the same age. Our education system seems to work better for girls. We have concentrated resources on upping the numbers going to university so have prioritised academic over practical skills, technical education has been neglected.