I know a family who immigrated from East Asia to US about 30 years ago. The father of the family was from a poor family (which was the case for everyone 30 - 40 years ago) who couldn't afford to send their kids to college, and so he had minimal education (up to High school?) in their native country. He worked as a carpenter all his life. Due to lack of money, he received minimal medical care (aka no checkups etc), and passed away rather young.

The 2 kids went to an inner city high school. They went onto University of California, which were definitely affordable 20 years ago, with loans and grants.

One went to an Ivy League and got PhD in STEM and now working in that field. The other also went to a top ranked public university and got PhD in STEM also.

Had the dad been given a chance to get a proper education, who knows what he could've achieved?