History of IDEA
Jeannie Oakes, Founder and Former Director
Youth Voice in School Finance
NEW REPORT: Los Angeles' road to A-G for all
Without Dollars and Sense Powerpoint
Past Educational Opportunity Reports
The social cost to academic achievement
- 11-22-2010
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Guest blog by Daniel Willingham/Washington Post
Is there a social cost to academic achievement? In other words, do adolescents punish high achievers by calling them nerds? At the roughest cut, the answer seems to be “no.” Academic success seems to go hand in hand with social success—it’s not a sizable effect, but it is present. A more fine-grained theory has it that the answer to that question varies with ethnicity. Sociologist John Ogbu suggested that involuntary minorities—African American and Native Americans, who did not come to mainstream America willingly—have a collective identity that is opposed to mainstream culture. Adolescents from these cultures will, the theory proposes, deride high-achieving peers for “acting white.” Academic success will be seen as rejecting one’s own culture in favor of the dominant culture. Is there any truth to this hypothesis? The evidence has been mixed. (more…)
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