This blog post is about the complex relationship between a parent’s incarceration and a child’s academic success. For me this relationship is personal and scholastic.
I was in fifth grade when my father, a lawyer, received a two-to-five year prison sentence for larceny. Although my family was confronted with the same challenges other families face when a parent is incarcerated (i.e. housing and food insecurity, inadequate heath care, childcare challenges, etc.), we also had considerable privilege. My family was white, and despite our financial ruin we were able to remain in our middle-class community. We roamed safe neighborhoods and attended established schools. My five siblings and I had a great mother, and we had each other. For these reasons it’s easy to see my father’s incarceration in isolation, or as that which did not directly impact my educational opportunities. It would be easy to see it that way, but that would be a mistake and a missed opportunity.
[For more of this story, written by Megan Sullivan, go to http://blogs.ncte.org/index.ph...ts-academic-success/]
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