In fact, most had returned to school at some point to advance their education and improve their labor-market prospects. Differences between educational attainments of children from wealthier neighborhoods have more to do with what happens when school is out of session than what happens in school. In The Baltimore Beginning School Study, poor children, compared to children from families who are better off financially, made equivalent gains in math and reading scores during the course of the school year. Doris Entwisle and her colleagues found that differences in achievement develop while school is not in session. Poor children lose ground over the summer, whereas children from wealthier backgrounds continue to gain ground.
Maternal employment has little if any negative impact on children.
Thornton, Freedman, and Axinn reported that maternal employment has been unrelated to child outcomes. The book will make an impressive case for the value of the home-movie approach to studying lives and for the importance of the Murray Research Center as a repository for these precious materials that outlive the investigators who collect them. Jacquelyn B. James is assistant director of the Henry A. Murray Research Center at Radcliffe.