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

[Carla786]

A lot of stuff I've read recently has argued the way school is set up disadvantages boys compared to girls. But this doesn't explain why white working class boys would perform worse than wc boys of other ethnicities.
Asian wc boys are more likely to have present fathers,,but black wc boys less likely than white boys (I think). So absent fathers I'm sure are part of the problem, but then maybe also black boys then have a protective factor that still boosts performance which white boys don't have? What could this be?

And how can white wc boys be helped? The question also remains why white wc girls are apparently less affected too : maybe I suppose tying in to school methods being more suited to the average girl?

https://www.spiked-online.com/2026/03/24/the-betrayal-of-white-working-class-boys/

Thanks for the info, I think culture has a lot to do with it. I think here for a long time people from working class backgrounds would work hard in a manufacturing job and have a decent standard of living, there was social housing and publicly owned services and resources. A lot of that is gone now. Working class people were told when the factories shut to stick in at school and go to university to get one of the new high paid, high tech jobs that would be coming. However a lot of these jobs just didn't exist and working class people lacked a lot of the social and cultural capital that middle class people competing for the same work had. Its really complex I think. I remember when studying for my masters in London, I was the only person on my course not to have been to private school and at a party once my peers openly laughed about my accent saying I sounded like someone who would use a farmfoods bag as my carry on luggage, the British class system is real and perhaps doesn't apply to those who immigrate here in the same way although they can of course face other prejudices and I do think many 1st generation immigrants work really, really hard.

Cucumber sandwiches as a status symbol sounded odd to me initially- the only time I've ever come across that was in The Importance of Being Earnest. Otoh this anecdote would be taking place in the 1960s or 70s probably if before the grammar closures so probably would fit into that context.

Everyone gets 13 years of free education . I wish I had had that pointed out to me when as a teenager thinking it was cool not to care.

I absolutely do not get it.

My very much lower class grandmother (worked in a factory her whole life) was obsessed with cucumber sandwiches. Cucumber and tuna. And weirdly enough cucumber and honey (oddly delicious)

Nope. No chip.
Do you eat cucumber sandwiches? Do you feed them to visiting children?
I used to feed visiting kids spag bol. Or biscuits etc. Always went down well.
If I was eating or feeding someone cucumber sandwiches I would put some cheese on it. In fact, I'd probably add crisps too.
My mother cooked a hearty meal every evening. Roast on Sunday, cottage pie made from lefovers on monday, steak on Friday .
As usual, mumsnet has descended into madness because someone who is long dead once fed a visiting child cucumber sandwiches.
Middle class mummy was not only upset that my dad had an actual car, which was better than hers; but we also lived in a detached house. She lived in a semi. Her assumptions about me were totally wrong.

I think this is part of the issue when you are sorting by ethnicity and race together.

Are Caribbean families more likely to be wc than African families, for historical reasons? If so - it's pretty clear why Africans would have fewer poor outcomes, more of them the advantages of being middle or even upper middle class.

You also see that when we talk about wc white families, a certain number are really properly considered underclass or left behind or however you want to designate that group. Usually generationally. Those kids are always going to be high risk. I suspect you are less likely to see that with families who are more recently arrived, they might be working class, but not generational members of an underclass. Even if they were where the family originate, they had enough resources, inner or externally, to emigrate.

I also think in some cases it's significant that there can be extra educational options for minorities. I know lots of wc white rural kids where I live who struggle to pay for education, there are a lot more options for those who can access scholarships, bursaries, or positions designated for racialised groups.

You are rambling and none of your posts make sense.
I think the only one that has descended into madness is you. Everyone else seems pretty coherent even if we don’t all agree with each other.

I apologise for being born. You were the one who is obsessed with cucumber sandwiches. I merely mentioned an anecdote from my schooldays, highlighting the difference between a working class child and a woman who thought she was middle class and better than everyone else.
Have a happy life