Znaczenie edukacji dziecka w rodzinie z klasy średniej
The importance of a child’s education in middle class families

Summary/Abstract: The following study proves the thesis that in present-day Polish conditions children’s education does not depend on their intellectual capacity, but it rather depends on the financial background, the social and cultural capital and parent’s social class. In addition, family status and family members contribute to a child’s position in a specific social space. At the beginning I would like to indicate Pierre Bourdieu’s theory as the main basis upon which this study is based, afterwards I present selected conceptions and definitions of the middle class. In the next part I describe the research concerning middle class children’s standard of education. This is the background on which I present the program of self-study and its results. The materials presented show the value which is assigned by parents to their children, their upbringing, and education. In addition, it enables one to analyse the mentality of this specific group of parents and the educational patterns which they use to support their children. The research results and the opinions described in the text lead us to assume that parents from the middle class provide their children with practically unlimited support, which will help them in the future to reconstruct their social status. In general, the main goal of parents from the middle class is to create life chances for their children, so they can succeed in life. The analysis proves that middle class children can count on financial, material, psychological, and public support from their parents. In my paper I elaborate on how much importance middle class parents attach to their children’s education as well as what their expectations and plans related to education are.

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