Concerted Cultivation in Organizational Spheres: Stacey Marshall
The Marshall Family
Families and Institutions
- Stacy Marshall (10) and her sister Fern Marshall (12)
- Lorrie Marshall is the mother and Lonny Marshall is the father
- Both in their forties and both are college graduates
- Have been married once before, no children from previous marriages
- Mr. Marshall Work as a civil servant, at night 6 days a week and Ms. Marshall work in the computer industry
- Ms. Marshall’s parents live 4 hours away and visit 3 to 4 times a year, but talk on the phone weekly
- Stacy is a “personable person” who can keep to herself at home but be lively with her friends
- Stacy and Fern often annoy each other but there at times sweet moments (Pg.167)
- All families interact with many different institutions
- For middle-class mothers, the boundaries between home and institution are fluid, meaning that the mother mediates their childrens’ lives
- The child’s problem thus becomes the mother’s problem
- Ms. Marshall firmly believes that it is her responsibility as a parent to ensure that her daughter activities provided an opportunity for a positive and self-affirming experience
- Ms. Marshall monitors Stacey like a hawk, ready to intervene in an institutional setting such as in the classroom, doctor’s office, and day camp
- Middle-class children like Stacy Marshall receive opportunities to learn how to negotiate the world around them by observing their parents
- The mother is a role model that can help them acquire skills for effective interaction with institutions later on in life
Race: Constant Worries, Intermittent Interventions
Transmission of Skills + Intervening in School: Early and Often
- Ms. Marshall knows from experience that subtle forms of discrimination are always present
- Ms. Marshall does read into the racial side of observations her children make
- Art, the bus driver, was ousted as a racist when it was pointed out that he would treat the children of different races differently, with a clear disdain of the Black children
Home
- Ms. Marshall is aware she is Stacey’s role model, and deliberately teaches her strategies for managing organizational strategies
- Stacey is even encouraged and allowed to decline to be part of her gymnastic center’s elite team if she doesn’t want to, and is given advice by her mother on how to deal with such a situation
- As she is given a voice when deciding which program she wants to enroll in, Stacey speaks with authority when she is asked what she thinks
- Stacey’s word is treated as very important, if not definitive
- Ms. Marshall takes the quiet yet assertive approach when dealing with representatives of institutions, such as Stacey’s instructors (Pg 176)
A Crucial Dimension of Concerted Cultivation: Overseeing Institutions
- By teaching their daughters and sons how to get organizations to meet their individualized needs, white as well as Black middle-class mothers pass along skills that have the potential to be extremely valuable to their children in adulthood
- Race has played a role in how parents viewed issues and the number of potential problems parents and children faced
Selecting and Customizing Children’s Leisure Activities
- The family lives in a quiet suburban street with a two story house
- Their income is $100,000 per year but Ms. Marshall often worries about money, as she says the computer industry lack job security.
- Racial barriers have recently limited the children’s circle of friends to all black children(Pg. 168)
- Like the Tallingers and the Williamses, the Marshalls have hectic schedules
- Stacy is in gymnastics and Fern plays basketball, both attend Sunday school, Stacy is part of the church choir, which rehearses on Fridays and perform on every third Sunday. Both are “junior ushers” at church, and both have piano lessons
- Like the Williamses, the Marshall prefer to reason with their children rather than use directives
- The parents can be frustrated with the girls but they don’t yell or beat them
- They don’t suppress Stacy’s or Fern’s thought or action even if others might think it is rude towards adults (Pg. 169)
- Most middle-class parents are engrossed in being involved in their children’s schedules and activities.
- Unlike the Williamses, both Marshall parents agree that it is overwhelmingly Ms. Marshall who does the heavy lifting when it concerns the children
- (Pg 170 last paragraph) Here, it’s shown how Ms. Marshall both chooses an activity that Stacey herself enjoys, and pushes her to stick to it and get better
- Ms. Marshall uses her social network, such as other parents for advice, as well as friends and relatives who are educators, psychologists, lawyers, and doctors
- As a result of this trend, middle-class parents are more well-connected than their lower-class or poor counterparts
- She sees teachers as people who have to adjust to meet students’ needs, not the other way around (pg 172)