Factors Creating Poverty - Essay Example

1. Monetary issues: This involves factors like economic hardship or poverty in families or funding in schools.
2. Personnel/ structural aspects: This involves factors like changes in the family structure that may arise due to divorce or the death of one parent. In a school setting, it includes staffing and resource matters.
3. Social climate of the context: This involves associational networks, warmth, cohesiveness, and support that one may gain from their setting.
4. Connections between systems: This involves factors like how close parents may feel connected to their children’s school.
These dimensions, within each of the settings mentioned earlier, exert their influence on the outcomes of individuals especially children, and therefore they also represent the area of intervention in their lives. Two of these dimensions have been examined in detail below:
Monetary Issues

Family Setting
Within a family setting, monetary issues can be protective or risky as it influences the functioning of the family, especially that of the children. Economic hardship can result in malnutrition resulting in neonatal damage and children with low birth weights. In this environment of poverty, there is a greater likelihood for childhood illnesses to go untreated. Child abuse and exposure to violence and accidents have also been found to be higher in these settings. Economic hardships are also known to increase stress levels in parents, thereby affecting their emotional state, which in turn is reflected in their behaviors, emotions, and cognitions toward their children (Conger et al., 1992). Poverty is also a risk factor for school dropouts among children and unemployment among adults. These issues are magnified when we consider families of minority groups that face several other challenges like immigration, racial and ethnic disparities, and disruption in addition to poverty (Moore et. al., 2009).

School Setting
Within a school setting, monetary issues can be protective or risky as it influences the functioning of the school and can act as a deciding factor as to whether a school is successful in imparting education to its pupils or not. Although the cost that the school incurs per pupil is not predictive of the outcome, it certainly is important. Adequate staffing and the presence of adequate teaching resources in schools also depend on the funds available and is an important factors in the overall success of the school which may be reflected in the percentage of children graduating, absenteeism among students and teachers, and the ability to address children with special needs or learning disabilities. Studies have revealed that a minimum level of funding for schools is important for them to function efficiently. However, beyond that, the funding does not appear to have much effect. When school resources are limited, especially in minority rural schools, the credential and salaries of teachers were found to be related to student achievement.
Personnel/ Structural Aspects
Family Setting
Within a family setting, the structural aspects of the presence or absence of caregivers are of critical importance, especially concerning children. Parents, siblings, and caregivers are involved in a complex, multi-layers interaction that forms the structural environment in which a child grows. These interactions play an important role in the outcomes. Factors like divorce, death and dysfunctional family push children and their families to adapt to the settings in which they are embedded. Therefore when the environment becomes chaotic or nonsupportive of healthy functioning, children and their families make adaptations to adjust to these changes in their environment that may involve risky behaviors like alcohol, drug addictions, and risky sexual behaviors.

Teachers are an important resource that affects the outcomes in children. Factors like low pay, high turnover, inconsistency in the classroom, and absenteeism translate into poor performance in students. Studies have revealed that in schools with limited funds if teachers had high expectations from their pupils, the overall outcome of students was better (Timperley, 2003). According to Mosteller (1995), students who were in small class sizes with 13 to 17 pupils during their initial years of schooling, performed much better in reading and math standardized tests than their counterparts who studied in regular size classes of 22 to 25 students. This difference in performance was especially prominent among minority students. According to Eccles (1999), students in junior high schools experience more discipline and teacher control and fewer opportunities for decision-making at a time when they desire to become more responsible and independent. This mismatch in student needs and school environment results in disengagement and school problems. Read More