>...parents who frankly just don’t give a shit...
From my experience teaching in multiple Western and non-Western countries, I believe that this factor outweighs all the others put together.
From my experience teaching in multiple Western and non-Western countries, I believe that this factor outweighs all the others put together.
My father is a black American who never went to college. He doesn't understand the point of education. He wanted me to a be a movie director or singer or otherwise "famous". He didn't give a crap about school and let me do whatever I wanted when I stayed with him a couple weekends a month.
My mother, an Indian immigrant, sat me down every night and made me do my homework even though she worked three jobs. She paid for twelve years of private schooling. She told me every single day that my education was the only thing I would ever have that would let me survive in this world.
Thanks to her obsession with education, I completed college and never stopped educating myself. I now work as a front-end dev and make six figures. I'm currently preparing to apply for master's programs. I live a happy and comfortable life. I have some savings in the bank. I am constantly working to educate myself. I don't have vague fantasies about becoming "famous" or winning the lottery to support myself.
Education is truly the only guarantee for people of color to achieve a comfortable life in the US. I would never have understood this without my Indian mother's cultural drive towards education.