Exploring the Context of Education

Bailey, Barbara, and Monica Brown. 1999. Schooling and masculinity: Boys’ perceptions of the school experience. Caribbean Journal of Education 21 (1&2): 42–57.

For the boys in this pilot study, financial constraints and community and school violence are the major factors contributing to their dropping out of the formal school system, and for their non-participation and resultant underachievement.

The data suggest that in the case of this group of boys, their underachievement results from the political economy of their situations rather than socialization or school factors. Socioeconomic factors have not been highlighted in much of the existing discourse on male underachievement, mainly because the focus has been on comparisons between the sexes rather than on intra-group factors, such as social class assignment, family form, income, and place of residence, and how these influence schooling and the school experience.