I meet the most interesting people when traveling. Often this takes place in taxi cabs or shuttles to and from the airport. The most recent example was the taxi cab driver I had a few days ago. He had a “need to talk.” The man entered the United States in 1986 from Eritrea under political asylum. Eritrea is a small African country located on the Red Sea between Sudan and Ethiopia. Mostly, the driver wanted to talk about his children, ages 12 and 14. He was obviously very proud of them and their achievements. Each of the boys is at the top of his class academically. The father said that he and his wife work very hard to provide for their children financially and to instill in them the value of hard work and the importance of education. “After all,” he said, “education is the key to success.”

 

Why is it that this value is so strong in those who immigrate or are the first-born of immigrants while many students who are born here do not see the value of hard work?

 

In his article The Multiplier Effect, Stuart Anderson states, “Students from immigrant families seem acutely aware of the opportunity to excel that their parents gave them by immigrating to the United States.”

 

“An astounding 60 percent of the top science students in the United States and 65 percent of the top math students are the children of immigrants.”

 

If you saw the documentary, Spellbound, you know that a disproportionate number of excellent spellers are children of immigrants, or are naturalized citizens themselves.

 

While it is certainly helpful to be born with high intelligence, it is also necessary to have a strong work ethic to maximize that natural ability. Sometimes, I think, that we expect all the hard work to come from the school systems rather than from the kids. We are concerned that the schools are not providing enough for our children and yet we excuse our children’s lack of interest in pursuing educational goals themselves.

 

In Some Immigrant Families Take a Non-Standard Approach to Involvement in Their Children's Education, Gerardo Lopez examines how the parents of a Mexican migrant family achieved success in promoting an educational work ethic for their children without taking the traditional path of participation in the PTA, committees at school, or fund raisers.

 

Perhaps those of us whose families have been in this country for generations can benefit from some of the strategies that work for many immigrant families.