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/

Mm. Yeah. Paradoxical.

A theory: social mobility meant people in aspirational, academically able working class families in the middle of the last century tended to become middle class instead. The families that were left behind are more likely to remain stuck there. Most working-class immigrant families came a bit later and are more likely to still be in the aspirational mindset (indeed said aspirations were part of the reason they moved in the first place: those without aspirations simply stayed in their home countries).

There may be geographical factors in play too.

White working class areas like the ex-mining areas in Nottinghamshire have very few people of ethnic minorities. There are very few job opportunities and multi-generational low attainment and lack of aspiration. The factors impacting areas like this are going to be different to intercity London or Birmingham which also have a different racial mix.

Low parental expectations and families not seeing value in education.

I agree with this. I have a friend who is white working class, not a single mother as such but her partner is useless so yeah I think of her as a single mum.lol.

Well one of her kids was struggling with GCSE maths and wanted to get better and she basically said “it’s fine, I wasn’t good at maths either it runs in our family so don’t worry about it.”

So compare that approach with many black and Asian mothers on a low income that I know - single or not - they would happily scrimp and save to get their child a maths tutor or at least ask about free additional lessons in schools.

I did try and encourage my friend to do this for her (teen) child but she got a bit defensive. She also doesn’t seem to know what ls going on in her child’s schools and she was often call me up to ask about school holidays, when exams are, what subjects her kids are taking (how would I know 🤣)

Btw this the woman is white but some of her kids are mixed race.

I was wondering - what are the stats for mixed race children? As they are often (not always) raised by a white single mother. I’d be curious to know if their achievement levels were similar to white boys.

I know this is just one example I’ve provided, but I worked in education for 10 years and it was a pattern I’ve seen a lot

It's very common. My teen has kids (white boys) in their form at school who regularly say 'my dad says maths doesn't matter anyway'. It's a sort of defensive response some white men of a certain age seem to have because they found maths hard so rather than acknowledging that they like to dismiss it a bit and say its 'pointless anyway' and 'you won't use most of it' or 'you don't need it in real life' etc etc.

Indeed, wealthy Nigerians send their children to boarding school in the UK, but affluent Jamaicans utilize their own domestic colonial era heritage prestigious high schools and then send their kids to Ivy League schools in the US.

Sorry, what?!

Very curious as to the driver for this post. Carla 786 are you a student, politician or just a subject you are thinking about ?
What are your views on this topic ?

I think Britions of all colours and backgrounds have adopted some serious victim mentality tbh. “I can’t study because people are prejudiced against me for being white/black/jedi.” “I can’t help my kid read the school needs to do it for me”.”historical injustices mean I can’t be held to any kind of standard today”. “I don’t like seeing my kid get stressed out so I don’t enforce homework”.

People need to get a grip and develop some sense of control over their own lived. I do think theres is some merit in government intervention where there are clearly problems with disengaged parents, it’s a crying fucking shame that children who would with the right guidance would have done fine are left unemployable. But ultimately this is something these boys parents are choosing for them. How do you fix that. Even if the nonsense about immigrant kids getting extra special lessons was true how does that stop your kid from opening a book? Also if I lived in a town that was deindustrialised and jobs left I’d be drilling it into my kids head that they were going to do well in school and get out, being unemployed is not an option.

I think this is a great theory as I believe that low aspirations and low levels of achievement are part of a culture amongst some groups that has been compounded over lots of generations. Their parents, grandparents and great grandparents were largely the same so it's hard for them to envisage any other way. They also know that ultimately all of their ancestors have been 'fine' despite their lack of achievement. The welfare state has propped people up for so long now that many families don't have any living memory of a time before then. The assumption and expectation is that even if you do nothing for yourself that the state will step in and meet your needs.

I don't think most WC families from other races have this history so they are more flexible in thought and aspiration. They also may living relatives that remember very difficult times in other countries and so the same sense of entitlement isn't as engrained.

Re. This idea of immigrant kids getting extra lessons to read/learn English let’s not forget many Black and Asian boys are British born.

And many of the former in particular may only speak English at home, so being Black or Asian does not always equal : EAL/ESL needs.

My kid wouldn't revise until his football coach told him to. (Anacdata)

There's no support or sen children. You are judged by your address and marital status middle class married parents get sympathy for their kids sen behaviour anybody else doesn't. (Seen from both sides of the system. )

Working class parents are presumed not to be good parents by default, middle class are seen to be good by default.

The worst educational outcomes are for Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children. For the obvious reasons of moving around and working within the family, so not requiring qualifications. Of course, prejudice and discrimination has impacted as well.
Schools facilitate all manner of catch up and interventions, but sometimes they're just not engaged with.

No champions for wc white boys. Education moved to a more female oriented style of education which put wc girls abead of boys in seconday education. Newly immigrant families push their children as important to succeed in new country. Some areas of country lost their working class employment opportunities for young men.

If you believe that you have to work much harder to get just a sniff of what the other group get, whereas in practice you considerably outperform that other group, then in reality you must be working many, many times harder than the other group, or your belief that you are heavily disadvantaged must be nonsense.

There has been a lot of identifying, supporting and "championing" going on in schools. All results are broken down, and teachers have to respond to that.
Every school is aware of every cohort and outcomes.
Early predictions in yr10 are used to support those under achieving.

When was the last time anyone on the thread heard a school teacher say "plumbing/carpentry/motor mechanic/hairdresser/beauty, are brilliant trades to get into and will make you a small businessperson. It's important to grasp the literacy and numeracy foundations, so you can write your estimates, chase your bad payers and keep your accounts".

Educationalists in the UK need a hard reality check. Not everyone learns for the love of learning or find joy in Jane Austin or a quadratic equation, but it would be helpful to support more people to earn enough to make a living and instill a better work ethic.

Your first paragraph? They do, frequently.
If that doesn't happen where you teach, that needs to change because they're not meeting needs.

Where does "work ethic" come from? Is it the school's job to instill it, or is it learned from family and environment, that people apply themselves and work for progression and gain?

Oh I understood exactly what you were saying. It was just rather ignorant.

Whilst they are described as "working class" are their parents in fact working? I spent a year doing a lot of work with teens/young adults in magistrates courts, and in a year only one of my clients (out of hundreds, I was seeing around 3-7 per day) was employed. The vast majority not only had never had a job but didn't know anyone in their immediate social and family circles who had ever had a job. Without that aspiration I think education must seem pointless. It would be interesting if the stats would separate out working and non-working lower income families, as if that does make a difference then that gives a focus for making a change.

Non-white families may be in the lower income tier for other reasons but I imagine more of them are working and may well have a higher degree of education. If they have come to this country in the past 1- 2 generations they almost certainly have higher aspirations.

The other thing is that as others have said, school is only the starting point for education. Most "middle class" families have piles of books and take their kids on days out to museums/beaches/farms/ zoos etc all of which provide a foundation for learning. If a family is from a non-white background they may be likelier to do additional schooling at the weekend e.g. learning languages like hindi or Chinese or religious schooling at the temple or Sunday school.

Yes the government can pour millions into any intervention but if the target group are not engaging then it's pointless.

Too true. I've seen many initiatives fail.
We give free tablets and study guides to such students, extra sessions, catch up classes, parental involvement meetings and 1-2-1 with TAs in the lesson. Varying outcomes, it has to be said.

This ⬆️. Cultural capital. Giving your child music lessons, taking them to museums and art galleries, the sights of different cities etc. leads to better outcomes.