Investigates a view of multiculturalism that could help analyze problems regarding governance in socially excluded neighborhoods, summarizing results from previous research on social dynamics in socially excluded neighborhoods. Uses Parekh's theory of multiculturalism to outline the major components of a multicultural perspective, suggesting that…

The Prime Minister of Jamaica outlines global economic and human development challenges and the role of education in building a learning society. (SK)

Discusses the history and problems of the Community Action Program and the War on Poverty from the 1960s-1980s, highlighting San Antonio, Texas, and the San Antonio Neighborhood Youth Organization. Suggests that the War on Poverty's historical significance was more political than economic, and it emerged as a program that Hispanic and Black San…

Young female dropouts may make several kinds of educational investments, all of which enhance earned income. Completing the General Educational Development (GED) Test increases income 25%; GED plus 1 year of training or college increases it 50%. How4ver, the increase in earnings is not enough to lift a family out of poverty. (Contains 312 notes…

Describes how Puerto Rico's teenage tutor, Jorge Aneudy Villalba, leads a children's learning crusade through an urban desert of poverty and despair, determined to prove the kids from the projects can make their own future. (Author/EV)

This study builds on research that examines the effects of microenterprise on poor women in the United States. Household income, income from the business, and poverty status were examined over time and comparisons were drawn among three groups of women: low-income women who participated in one of seven U.S. microenterprise assistance programs;…

Les Daniels is beginning his ninth year as the superintendent of the 3,360-student Greenwood Public Schools in the Mississippi Delta, one of the nation's poorest non-urban regions. He spent the previous seven years as superintendent in McComb, Mississippi, where he started teaching in 1965. He is the first black to head either school system.…

In 1974, Ronald Reagan called the United States a "shining city on a hill." A decade later, Mario Cuomo responded by speaking to us about another city that was not on a shining hill. His "Tale of Two Cities" speech, delivered at the 1984 Democratic National Convention, was not only moving but also haunting. In this other city…

This paper argues the case for re-visiting the concepts of high and low skills as used in academic and political debates in the older industrial countries. There the concept of low skills has, for a number of reasons, acquired negative connotations in that low skilled jobs are seen to "drag down" the economy and therefore something which…

The rapid economic growth of Vietnam provides an interesting insight into the sharp decline in child labor. A study of the rising economic status of the population across Vietnam shows that children returned to school or stopped working as their family incomes grew. The decline in child labor is steep in poor households as they emerged from…

The social class differences impact students' engagement with literacy practices in the classrooms. Teachers must hear and validate stories of poverty to gain class-specific understanding.

In this article we explore education policy changes in South Africa through a rights-based framework. We situate our analysis in the context of deepening poverty and inequality arguing that progress (or the lack thereof) in schools cannot be divorced from poverty and its consequences. We show that education reform in South Africa has been situated…

Rural regions include places where food sources are not evenly distributed, leading to areas of concentration and food desert--places where few or no grocery stores exist. Individuals are hypothesized to depend on personal connections and the civic structure of where they live to help them solve the problem of food insecurity. We find that…

While our world is being transformed by rapid developments in 'new' technology, nearly one-third of humanity continues to be deprived of the benefits available from technologies centuries old. Northern markets rather than Southern needs increasingly determine what scientific and technological advances are developed and for whom. We urgently need…

Marriage among women in Latin America occurs early in life and is nearly universal in spite of the social and economic changes and instability in the region. We use demographic measures to illustrate the precociousness, persistence, and universality of marriage during the past 50 years. We argue that marriage is central to social life because…