Failing Working Class Girls

That all boys under-perform at school and all girls do well is both mistaken and misleading. Statistics recording the admirable rise in the achievements of middle-class girls and the deviant behavior and low exam attainments of working-class boys have wholly obscured the educational experience of a large group of underachieving pupils: working-class girls. This book gives them their long-overdue exposure. Gillian Plummer provides a perceptive and constructive analysis of the autobiographical accounts of six educated working-class women at home and school - of which she is one. She first presents historical, sociological, and psychological interpretations of class and gender subordination and shows how inferiority is a learned position for working-class girls. She argues that what it means to be "working-class, female and educated" remains largely untheorized, and shows how inappropriate were many of the research methods used for gathering data on this small group who aspired to formal education in the 1950s, 60s and 70s. There follows an exploration of life in a working-class family where poverty, overcrowding and poor health made life hard. The women's accounts of their relationships with their parents challenge romantic notions, especially of affection between working-class mothers and daughters. Also discussed are parental and peer support for educational aspirations, and the issue of schooling as a social equalizer. Within this framework, a new picture is drawn of the self-worth, academic aspirations, opportunities and oppressions of working-class girls. It is a picture that schools and educational policy makers cannot afford to ignore.

Dr. Gillian Plummer is an Ofsted Inspector and educational consultant in Essex.