School Failure and Delinquency
Why Gangs Form
What Gangs
Provide
Why Youths Join
Gangs form due
to school failure and
low self-esteem.
An alternative
to school and
high self-esteem.
Out of their frustration
with school.
Explanations in Brief:
1. Poor academic performance for some children may lead to low selfesteem which may lead to truancy and dropping out of school. This, in turn,
may lead to the formation of a gang to regain a sense of self-esteem.
2. Some neighborhood schools are failing in their effort to educate and
socialize students which may result in a child's rejection of school and the
formation of a gang as a mechanism for filling time, acting out against the
school, acquiring skills needed to make money, and building self-esteem.
3. School failure and delinquency are the result of another issue - problem
behavior syndrome (low IQ - Intelligence Quotient, turbulent family life, low
self-control and impulsivity, drug use, depression, malnutrition, abuse, and
disease). (Siegel and Senna, 1997, p. 365, italics added for clarity) Gangs may form when
children with this syndrome are brought together or seek one another out as
a support group.
The tri-city area of Pharr-Alamo-San Juan, Texas, has 5,000 gang members (about one-fourth of
the student body) attending the district's schools. It is an area of high drug use and drug trafficking
within 44 neighborhoods ("colonias") characterized by high unemployment, few job opportunities,
and substandard housing that is often without indoor plumbing. Children who are most at risk often
come from families involved in drug use and/or trafficking and frequently have been sexually
abused. (Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency, 1999, page, italics added for emphasis)
This part of Into the Abyss and the next section both deal with self-esteem. In order
for our discussion about school failure to make sense we need to have a shared
understanding of what self-esteem is and how it develops in an individual. "Esteem"
refers to the regard in which someone is held by others. If they are held in "high"
esteem, they are thought of positively. People who have high self-esteem regard
themselves as good people - they are satisfied with themselves, confident. They have
a sense of self-worth and self-competence. People with low self-esteem think poorly
of themselves.
Some children are able to build high self-esteem at home. Their parents or guardians
reward them for positive behaviors thus fostering the development of high selfesteem. These are children who are proud of what they do and who feel good about
themselves. Other children are struggling at home. They are abused, neglected, and
generally made to feel as though they are worthless. These children are likely to
develop low self-esteem and will feel badly about themselves. They also have a
propensity to feel negatively towards others.
Field Note: Standing in the checkout line at the grocery store
everyone heard a mother yell at her child saying "Put that damn
candy bar down! How many times have I told you to keep your hands
off that stuff? You little shit! I'm sorry I ever had you!"
Schools are also a social institution in which a child may develop either high- or low
self-esteem. When children succeed at school - earn good grades, are respected by
their teachers - they may develop high self-esteem. When children fail in school when teachers punish or ridicule them - they are likely to develop a low level of selfesteem.
Educational histories of juvenile female offenders reflected repeated failure, unrealistic ideations
about how well academic skills were being performed, a high percentage of students needing
special education, and unsatisfactory past relationships with teachers. (Fejes-Mendoza, et al., 1995, p 315)
The jury is out on whether there is a direct relationship between low self-esteem and
the risk of becoming a gang member. (Thornberry, 2001, p. 36) However, a persistent
correlation has been found to exist between poor academic performance and
delinquency. There are at least three explanations for this correlation.
One suggests that a student's poor academic performance eventually leads to
delinquency. Another suggests that it is the schools which are failing, thus producing
children who are ill-equipped for the future and who may become involved in
delinquency as a means of compensating for their deficiencies. The last explanation
suggests school failure and delinquency are each caused by a third factor- problem
behavior syndrome - and, therefore, neither poor academic performance nor failing
schools are to blame for a child's delinquency.
As you read about these various notions, perhaps you will agree that, while none have
been proven to lead directly to the formation of gangs, each is suggestive in its own
way.
The Impact of Poor Academic Performance
For some children, poor academic performance at school may lead to low selfesteem. (Curry and Spergel, 1992; Schwartz, 1989) This, in turn, may lead to truancy and dropping
out. As I witnessed over the past three years, some children who are truant socialize
with other truant children and social groups begin to form. While the likelihood of the
group becoming a gang is uncertain, the potential is there.
A gang may form in order for its members to gain a sense of self-esteem vis a vis their
role and activities in the gang. Within the gang students will also find alibis for their
truancy, other children to socialize with, and a venue for venting any humiliation,
frustration, or anger they may feel as a result of their failures in the school setting.
Thornberry tells us "Bowker and Klein (1983) have reported that students who have low
educational expectations are at increased risk for gang membership." He also notes
that "Gang membership is also more likely among adolescents whose parents have low
educational expectations for them (Schwartz, 1989). Poor school performance and low
commitment and involvement are also correlated with gang membership (Le Blanc and
Lanctot, in press)."
Poor school performance is known to be a strong predictor of involvement in crime. Children with
lower academic performance are more likely to offend, more likely to offend frequently, more
likely to commit more serious offences and more likely to persist in crime. (Maguin and Loeber, 1996)
These relationships can be found even when socioeconomic status and prior conduct problems
have been controlled. (ibid, p. 248)
Lower-Class Students in Middle-Class Schools
Mention of "frustration" regarding the school experience brings us to the work of
Albert Cohen. Cohen is famous in the field of criminology for his contribution
regarding the potential impact of the school experience on students from the lower
socio-economic classes. In a nutshell, here's what he has to say.
School personnel - administrators, teachers, counselors - are from the middle-class.
Some, or all, of the students at a given school may be from the lower socio-economic
classes. Cohen believes school personnel evaluate each student using their own
middle-class measuring rod. The middle-class values against which all students,
including poor ones, are measured include
ambition as a virtue;
an emphasis on the middle-class ethic of responsibility;
valuing the cultivation of skills and tangible achievement;
postponement of immediate satisfactions and self-indulgence in the
interest of achieving long-term goals;
rationality, in the sense of forethought, planning, and budgeting of time;
the rational cultivation of manners, courtesy and personality;
the need to control physical aggression and violence;
the need for wholesome recreation; and
respect for property and its proper care.
(Cohen, 1955)
According to Cohen, some lower-class children fail to measure up to the middle-class
values and feel frustrated as a result of their inability to measure up to the school's
expectations. He believes some of these frustrated children will act out by turning
the middle-class values upside down.
In a "reaction-formation" to this problem, these youths use the gang as a means of adjustment. In
the gang such youths act out their status frustrations in "non-utilitarian, malicious, negativistic"
forms of delinquency." (Yablonsky, 1997, p. 170)
By acting out he suggests that courtesy becomes rudeness. Respect for property
become vandalism. The need to control aggression becomes fighting, and so on. Of
course such behavior is defined as delinquent so those who violate the middle-class
standards are deviants, delinquents. Children who behave inappropriately are grouped
together - in the principle's office, in detention, and in treatment programs.
The informal association which takes place between them in those settings may lead
to gang formation as their relationships with each other mature. As Cohen indicated,
"The gang provides a legitimate 'opportunity structure' for working-class boys to strike
back at a larger society that produces their status-frustration problems." (Yablonsky, 1997, p.
171)
Truancy and Dropping Out of School
Let's shift the topic a little now and take a look at truancy and dropping out of school
as they impact a child's behavior. There is a substantial body of literature which
shows "... the evidence is clear that poor school performance, truancy, and leaving
school at a young age are connected to juvenile delinquency." (National Academy Press, 2000,
page) They are connected, or correlated. It hasn't been proven that one causes the
other but the two appear together consistently.
Truancy may be the beginning of a lifetime of problems for students who routinely skip school.
Because these students fall behind in their school work, many drop out of school. Dropping out is
easier than catching up.
Truant students are at higher risk of being drawn into behavior involving drugs, alcohol, or
violence. A California deputy assistant attorney who handles truancy cases says he has never seen
a gang member who wasn't a truant first. (Garry, 1996, p. 1)
Precise national data on the number of school children and dropouts who are
members of gangs is very difficult, if not impossible, to obtain. There are isolated
studies, among them a recent study in Chicago which found "... 5 percent of
elementary school children were affiliated with street gangs, as were 35 percent of
high school dropouts." (Sheldon, et al, 1997, page)
Present-day statistics alert us to the fact that there is a significant problem related to
dropping out, and it impacts certain ethnic and racial groups differently. Hispanic
Americans appear to be most at risk of dropping out and, as we learned earlier, they
represent the largest single ethnic group of gang members in the United States today.
The following are among the most recent and significant findings regarding the drop
out phenomenon.
Students in large cities are twice as likely to leave school before
graduating than non-urban youth.
More than one in four Hispanic youth drop out, and nearly half
leave by the eighth grade.
Hispanics are twice as likely as African Americans to drop out.
White and Asian American students are least likely to drop out.
More than half the students who drop out leave by the tenth
grade, 20% quit by the eighth grade, and 3% drop out by the
fourth grade.
Dropouts make up nearly half the heads of households on welfare.
Dropouts make up nearly half the prison population.
(Focus Adolescent
Services, 2000 , page)
Student nonattendance is a problem that extends much further than the school. It affects the
student, the family, and the community.
The Los Angeles County Office of Education identifies truancy as the most powerful predictor of
delinquency. Police departments across the nation report that many students not in school during
regular hours are committing crimes, including vandalism, shoplifting, and graffiti. When Van
Nuys, California, officials conducted a three-week sweep for truants on the streets, shoplifting
arrests dropped by 60 percent.
Absenteeism is detrimental to students' achievement, promotion, graduation, self-esteem, and
employment potential. Clearly, students who miss school fall behind their peers in the classroom.
This, in turn, leads to low self-esteem and increases the likelihood that at-risk students will drop
out of school. (ibid.)
According to researcher Wendy Schwartz, here are many reasons why a student may
drop out of school.
Didn't like school in general or the school they were attending.
Were failing, getting poor grades, or couldn't keep up with school
work.
Didn't get along with teachers and/or students.
Had disciplinary problems, were suspended, or expelled.
Didn't feel safe in school.
Got a job, had a family to support, or had trouble managing both
school and work.
Got married, got pregnant, or became a parent.
Had a drug or alcohol problem. (ibid.)
Poor academic performance may result in truancy and dropping out of school. If this
happens, it is likely to cripple a student's future as he or she find they are
unemployable in a job market which requires a high level of literacy in order to
compete successfully. For a variety of reasons we've already discussed, poor academic
performance may lead to the formation of youth gangs.
The second explanation for student failure in school has to do with the quality of the
school itself.
The Impact of Failing Schools
Few issues in education are of greater concern to policymakers, educators, and the general public
than the plight of ethnic and racial minority students in the nation's urban schools. To be sure,
many of these young people receive high-quality educations, achieve at admirable levels, and
complete high school equipped with the knowledge and skills needed for further education or
entry-level employment.
An alarming number of these students, however, achieve at significantly lower levels than their
white counterparts and leave school--either through dropping out early or at graduation--lacking
the skills and knowledge required by employers, colleges, and trade schools. (Cotton, 1991, p. 1)
Most street gang members live in impoverished conditions. The neighborhoods in
which they live are characterized by neglect at all levels - including neglect by their
city governments. One aspect of that neglect is reflected in the condition of many
inner-city schools.
Worn down, neglected, denied regular maintenance, the physical plant itself is
neglected. Neglected, too, are the school libraries, desks, and the teachers. The
teachers are overworked and faced with too few resources to do the job they were
hired to do and would like to do if conditions were better.
There is much evidence to indicate that problems relating to the public schools are concentrated
in the inner cities of our urban areas and in poor rural areas. It is not unusual for [inner-city]
schools to be housed in old, dilapidated buildings and to be staffed by a higher proportion of
teachers who are new or lack proper credentials. In addition, teachers in these schools are likely
to be short of books and other teaching materials. (Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll, 1998, p. 1)
Some teachers are not qualified to be teachers. In his study of school students, Kite
found that "of seven major factors contributing to school dropouts, four of the factors
were related to self-esteem, feeling that they lack the intelligence or the ability to
succeed in school ... they also suffered from low self-esteem, reinforced consciously
or unconsciously by parents or teachers." (Kite, 1989)
Further complicating matters is the fact that immigration and migration have resulted
in creating a diverse population of students in many of our inner-city schools. How
well prepared are the schools to deal with this diversity and the conflict which nearly
always accompanies it? How well prepared are the students? Research has shown that
some students are stigmatized by teachers and school administrators because of their
differences, which make the educational experience at school even more difficult for
the affected student.
Educational environments that are responsive to human diversity treat differences among students
as strengths that can be built upon or as needs that must be accommodated. Unresponsive and
ineffective systems of delivery ignore individual differences or, even worse, treat student
differences in a stigmatizing manner that reduces learning opportunities. (Wang et al., 1997, page)
Have you heard of social promotion? It is an unwritten policy wherein teachers allow
students performing at substandard levels to promote into the next grade at school
along with the children who performed well. In effect, they are consigning these
socially promoted children to a questionable future.
I understand why such promotions take place - teacher frustration and/or fear of the
consequences of holding a child back for another year and/or the desire to keep
students with other students of his or her age. But there are consequences for the
children who are socially promoted. They are not prepared for the next year in school
and are more likely to experience failure or other frustrations.
The situation at home is just as problematic for some inner-city children. Their
parents are far from helpful. They detract from their child's school performance by
discouraging attendance (so the parent can use the child to do something else shopping, stealing, taking care of the parent), failing to tutor the child, and hindering
teachers' efforts to help the child.
School Failure and Delinquency are the Result of a Third Factor: The Problem
Behavior Syndrome
It is possible that both school failure and delinquency are caused by a third factor the problem behavior syndrome. (Siegel and Senna, 1997, p. 365). If this is the case, then our
attention needs to turn to the causes of the problem behavior syndrome and an
understanding of whether the syndrome leads to gang formation or not.
Despite a serious and growing gang situation in the United States, the vast majority of
American youth - regardless of their age, social class, gender, race, or ethnicity - are
good kids. The resilience of the most impoverished, least educated, and most
discriminated against children is a marvel. We need to learn more about how these
children have managed to develop and maintain their high level of self-esteem in the
face of such overwhelming obstacles.
Poverty exposes children to a range of environmental hazards and is an effective marker for
negative child developmental outcomes. However, there are substantial individual differences
among poor children in their resilience and vulnerability to the same risk - poverty. More research
is needed to understand individual differences of children in response to the contexts of
poverty. (Chung, no date)
In Closing
Failing at school, for whatever reason, presents children and adolescents with a
significant challenge. Illiteracy, a lack of exposure to positive roles models in the
school (peers and teachers alike), and the frustrations which follow in the wake of
academic failure lay the foundation for powerlessness and a loss of hope. The
challenge for these children is to stay out of trouble, and to keep from associating
with other children who are in a similar predicament. I think there are too many
youth who have failed this challenge and, in their desperation, have come together
and developed into gangs.
School failure is but one of many explanations for the formation of gangs. A lack of
self-esteem, or never having been confident or satisfied with one's self may also be
contributing to the formation of gangs.