It’s Good For Kids To Have Friends From Different Socioeconomic Backgrounds – Here’s Why
Friendships that bridge across social class – “cross-class friendships” – can minimize middle school academic achievement differences that are based on the level of parents’ education, according to research from the UCLA School Diversity Project.
As scholars of adolescent development, we examined academic achievement differences among 4,288 middle school students in California based on their parents’ education level.
Seventeen percent of parents or guardians of students in our sample did not receive a high school diploma, 12% had a high school diploma or equivalent, 28% attended some college, 23% had a four-year college degree and 20% had a graduate degree.
Students’ academic achievement was assessed using GPAs, scores from the state standardized test, and academic engagement as reporte...