School Engagement and Avoidance among Criminal Justice-Involved Families with Young Children

• In Event: 1-069 - Innovative Developmental, Family, Educational, and Sociological Approaches to Studying Children with Incarcerated Parents

Integrative Statement

Introduction: Within the past three decades, the United States has witnessed significant growth in the number of individuals involved in our nation’s criminal justice system. Research has documented the short- and long-term consequences associated with involvement in this punitive system, emphasizing its intergenerational reach and devastating implications for transmissions of inequality. Part of this body of scholarship suggests that children’s health, social development, and educational success are (on average) negatively affected by parental involvement in the criminal justice system. Conversely, parental involvement in another consequential system – the school system – is known to boost children’s academic achievement, improve behavioral outcomes, strengthen ties to school, and enhance parents’ ability to advocate for their child. While efforts to increase parental involvement in schools among diverse families have expanded, little attention has been paid to how the rapid rise of surveillance, policing and involvement in punitive systems within the U.S. has the potential to undermine parental involvement in children’s schooling and educational outcomes.

Methods: This project employs mixed-methodologies in order to explore how system-involved parents of elementary-aged children view, interact and engage with schools and how teachers and school administrators perceive, work with and attempt to support these families. Propensity score matching and the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing data set (a rich longitudinal birth cohort study following 4,898 children and their parents from birth to age 15) are used in the quantitative component , while interview data drawn from 10 criminal justice involved parents and 10 school personnel are collected for the qualitative component.

Results: The quantitative project component suggests paternal incarceration is a unique marker of disadvantage. Both incarcerated fathers and children’s primary caregivers have reduced involvement in children’s education at home and at school– and fears about surveillance held by previously incarcerated fathers help to explain this reduced involvement. The qualitative component highlights mechanisms, processes and meanings that help explain and qualify associations observed in the quantitative project component.

Conclusions: Paternal incarceration, coupled with increased institutional surveillance, leads to lower levels of parental involvement in children’s schooling. This, in turn, undercuts children’s educational success and families’ ability to build trust with schools. As the number of young school-aged children with incarcerated parents grows, there may be strong, lasting, and negative consequences from this vicious cycle. The long-term prospects of children with current and formerly incarcerated parents are likely tightly linked to the children’s schooling, yet teachers often interpret parental involvement as a sign of the value parents place in their child’s educational success. Untangling the secondary harmful effects of parental incarceration – including harms to children’s schooling – is necessary to prevent reproducing inequalities from one generation to the next. Research that helps educators and policymakers better understand issues that arise for children and families where a father has served time can help in the design of supportive measures. Doing everything possible to increase parental involvement by the formerly incarcerated is important, because such steps are likely to strengthen family-school partnerships and improve the chances for educational success.

Author

• Anna R Haskins, Department of Sociology, Cornell University
  Presenting Author