Written by: Nicole Harris-Armstrong
Last updated: February 14, 2025
People in America are faced with limited opportunities based on the socioeconomic class they are born into. Growing up in America, we have heard that you can be whatever you dream of being. I am not sure if that is always the case for many people that live in this country. Many individuals face financial limitations due to their parents’ economic situation, which impacts their opportunities in this country. A middle-class family may make too much to qualify for financial assistance, even if the parents work multiple jobs, overtime, and weekends just to achieve that middle class income. When a student does not qualify for financial aid, grants, scholarships, loans, or discounts due to the amount of money their parents make, they are limited in the school choices to remain financially responsible. This may also impact that students career choice as well, as some professions require students to go to college for a long time, which will put students into a lot of debt with student loans if they choose certain careers. Per the Education Data Initiative, the average annual tuition at a university is $35, 248, which is out of reach for many middle-class income people that are trying to survive with the high costs of living. University enrollment has declined for middle class income families due to financial constraints. Middle class families make too much to qualify for college financial assistance but make too little to afford the inflated costs of college. For these reasons and more, people in America are faced with limited opportunities based on the socioeconomic class they are born into.
Working Class Concerns Regarding K-12 Education
Besides college, working class families are also concerned regarding their children’s K-12 education. Many years ago, parents in America did not worry as much about the quality of their child’s K-12 education as I see parents worry today. Even with the No Child Left Behind Law, or Every Child Succeeds Act, parents are still concerned about their children’s ability to thrive educationally in America. In 2002, the No Child Left Behind Law was enacted, which is a federal law that sets ambitious standards to hold schools accountable for student outcomes and promote student achievement through proficiency standardized tests. In 2015, Every Child Succeeds Act moved the accountability from federal to states which hold the schools accountable for achievement in Math and Reading assessments, high school graduation rates, and English-language proficiency. Every Child Succeeds Act removed the feature that teachers must be highly qualified in the subject that they are teaching. Due to that portion being removed from the act, there have been concerns such as inconsistencies in quality education and teachers that need to instruct subjects outside of their specialization. These things can play a role in poor academic achievement, along with high teacher turnover rates.
Gaps in K-12 Education
In the modern-day society we live in, there is fragmentation rather than wholeness in education. Parents see gaps in the K-12 education that their children are receiving and try to figure out how to help their child. We now live in a society where both parents must work just to survive in America due to high costs of living. Due to inflated costs of living, parents need to work full time jobs and sometimes have second jobs. With limited resources after working all day, parents are coming home with additional pressure in figuring out how they can help their child succeed academically at school. These days, parents need to do their own research on websites, plus other modalities to help their child learn basic things that were just given to American children freely through our school system years ago. Education that was once freely given is held back for some to have an advantage over others which is not fair to the children or parents that need to send their kids to public schools. I have noticed that we now have a society that tries to find any way possible to profit from the gaps in education that they know are present in our education system. I have seen more parents resort to learning outside of school such as tutoring that was not needed in years past. Tutoring costs money, and if parents do not have money left over from the inflated costs of living, their children are left behind due to the current gaps in education. In these respects, people in America are faced with limited opportunities based on the socioeconomic class they are born into.
Outside Forces that Want to Profit from K-12 Education
Compared to decades ago, there is more burden on the public education system because there are outside forces such as public charter schools and public home schools that want to profit and capitalize from K-12 public education. There are disadvantages to public school alternatives as they work on a lottery system, they play by different rules with a chance of corruption, they have fewer extracurricular options and are not as stable as traditional public schools. Some also are selective in the types of students they accept, as they do not accept all students. Some tout this as “school choice,” and that families should have the option to send their child where they want to. That is fine, but what I have noticed is that state governments have been taking massive quantities of school funds that are supposed to be going to the traditional public schools, and now those schools are no longer achieving as well as they once did. Traditional public schools that were once thriving need to give up important programs and make a lot of changes because they are now being bankrupted by the state. When I was younger, parents and students did not have this type of attack from people that wanted to profit from public K-12 education.
Inconsistencies in K-12 Learning
Even with laws established to try to improve the public education system, there are inconsistencies in learning material provided to the children. There are district wide decisions that encourage teachers to no longer teach students certain curriculum in which many teachers are following. The school provides workbooks to the children, yet the kids are not required to complete the workbooks, so the education is not consistent. Children used to be sent home with weekly spelling words in which they would be evaluated on, but now are no longer given spelling words to study. As a result, children are not learning how to spell which makes them more dependent on the computer to correct spelling and grammar mistakes. When children get low grades, they are not offered homework to do at home to improve their grades. There are also teachers that are teaching subjects outside of their specialization. For example, an Algebra teacher is teaching Geometry, and self admits that they are not as strong in Geometry as they are in Algebra. When a teacher is not specialized in the subject they are teaching, it trickles down to the children in having success in that subject. The pandemic also added additional stress on the schools as well as the teachers. The teachers that were used to providing face-to-face instruction needed to do all learning on the computer. Some children may require a different type of learning platform, but no matter what type of learner they are they must do everything on a computer which may affect their ability to succeed. On top of that, there is no way to measure if the material provided on a computer is comprehensive, consistent, or of high quality.
The state requires the children to do achievement tests throughout the year, but there is no action from the school regarding the results of the tests. The achievement tests could be a way to help the school tailor curriculum to each individual child. For example, if a child scores low on a particular area on an achievement test, the teacher could provide material to help improve that gap in learning for that child. On top of these things, parents need to advocate just for their child to receive basic services, as the traditional public schools do not have the funding that they once had. These are just a few examples, but there are so many more that put stress and burdens on parents today. As a result, people in America are faced with limited opportunities based on the socioeconomic class they are born into.
With all of this said, it is important to let teachers know that we genuinely care about them. Teachers work so hard, and our country is running into a shortage of teachers. Teachers’ jobs are not easy, many are leaving the field because they have a lot of pressure from outside forces, and they are not paid enough. Sadly, many of these problems are not of the teachers doing but are related to business model problems and politics that trickle down to the teachers, which makes their jobs even more difficult. In some countries, teachers are appreciated, valued and paid more than the teachers are in America. On top of that, some other countries are outperforming America in K-12 education because education is valued, so we as a country could be doing better for the people that live here.
Private K-12 Schools are Expensive
When parents know that there are these outside forces that want to profit from public K-12 education, there are thoughts to move to a private school that does not have the same outside forces. Private schools oftentimes have smaller class sizes, enhanced academic learning, and increased educational resources. There is also evidence that private schools perform better on college admission tests. The problem is the cost of private school is out of reach for many middle-class Americans. Private schools cost a lot of money, and if parents are already struggling to pay for necessities, they have no other choice but to go to a traditional public school, charter school, or home school. According to the Education Data Initiative, in 2021 the average annual tuition for private elementary and middle school is $12,790 and private high school costs $15,344. Some schools offer financial aid, grants, scholarships, loans, or discounts but some people do not qualify and even so it still might not be enough for some families to afford. Tuitions and inflation are rising, and middle-class family’s incomes are not growing which are factors that contribute to America’s growing wealth divide. At the end of the day, people in America are faced with limited opportunities based on the socioeconomic class they are born into.
Due to many factors, the middle class is dwindling in our country. The middle class needs to pay a high percentage of taxes relation to their income, must deal with inflated assets such as housing, excessive costs in healthcare, food, cars, and day-to-day living. Something needs to give, as this is not working for many people that live in this country. My hope in writing this blog is to make America a better place to live, and more affordable again. I wrote a related post a few weeks ago titled Home Prices are Inflating Faster than Incomes in America and Housing Cannot Be Both a Profitable Asset and a Human Right in which I would encourage you to read, a Resource page to help people in need, as well as a Basic Bills Tracker and Budget Planner in which you can find directly on my blog Shop page and on Etsy.
I wrote a poem in honor of our teachers…
