DiMaggio, Paul (1982). "Cultural Capital and School Success: The Impact of Status Culture Participation on the Graes of U.S. High School Students." American Sociological Review. Vol. 47 (April 189-201).
This article explores cultural capital, which is the non-financial asset low income students can possess. Cultural capital is the educational and intellectual knowledge a child’s parent’s posses and their ability to share this knowledge with their child. The article starts off by stating that parents economic or ethnic background is in no way a compete way to measure a child’s likelihood to succeed academically. Rather the reason low economic backgrounds are often associated with poor academic results is because there is a correlation between low economic status and low cultural capital. Therefore, if a low income household raises its’ children in an environment with high cultural capital their children will be just as likely to succeed academically as a child from a upper economic family with the same cultural capital. The article uses data from the Netherlands in 1982 to show that across all levels of economic and ethnic backgrounds the number one indicator of student academic performance was the level of cultural capital they experienced at home. The study showed that students with high cultural capital were more likely to advance to secondary school versus and continue on to higher education compared to pursuing vocational training.
I agree with the assertions made in this article. I feel that the parents are the number one factor in a student’s academic success. It is much easier for a child in a poor school with driven parents to succeed than it is for a child in a wonderful school with non-invested parents to succeed. Cultural capital shapes a child’s entire attitude towards education, thus it is only fitting that it would show such a strong correlation towards success rate. It seems very common sense, if a child is constantly being bombarded with importance of academics at home they are more likely to succeed in school. Furthermore, some parents simply do not understand how the educational system works. A parent who is familiar with the college application process is going to be far more adept to aid their child’s college application process than a child whose parents never went to college.
Yes, cultural capital is definitely a benefit to students. Its beneficial for the classroom and in the workforce. But the question becomes how do you get students who have low student capital to have some.
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