Teatro Comunitario

THECONSEQUENCESONTHEACADEMICCAREERSOFSTUDENTS

The cultural capital represents the students’ cultural inheritance from their families and communities. This category may include variables such as the parent’s education, the parenting models, the community cultures such as ethnicity and religion, variables that can influence the students’ social acceptance. If the cultural level of the student is substantially different from the university culture that seeks to integrate him, we predict that this can generate a communicational conflict between the student and the institution, resulting in difficulties of integration.

We used the father’s education level as an indicator towards the student’s family intellectual level, grouping the variables in three categories of education: low level which represents a person that didn’t finish upper secondary school; medium level which represents a person that graduated upper secondary school and some professional courses, but didn’t enrol in higher education and superior level which represents the person which has a university diploma.

Table 16: The relationship between the residence and father’s education

Country

Father’s education Total Low level Medium

level Superior level % within Lived until 14 years old Romania Lived until 14 years old

urban 24.5 56.2 19.4 100.0

rural 38.5 50.7 10.8 100.0

Total 29.1 54.4 16.5 100.0

Hungary

Lived until 14 years old

urban 29.8 50.9 19.3 100.0

rural 50.4 44.0 5.5 100.0

Total 35.7 48.9 15.4 100.0

Source: HERD database 2012

As it may be observed from Table 16, the two analyzed variables are associated. As the chi-square tests confirmed this aspect, the student’s father’s level of education is lower in rural areas than in urban areas. This finding is in accordance with the national data regarding Romania and possibly with those from Hungary.

While analyzing the data we found no evidence of a relationship between the father’s education and prior academic achievements (upper secondary school), a surprising result. When we analyzed the relationship between the university academic performance and the student’s father educational level, we learned that the performance scholarships increase with the father’s educational level (Table 17).

Table 17: The relationship between the residence and the performance scholarship

Lived until 14 year old Performance scholarship Total

Yes No

% within Father’s education Urban Father’s education

Low level 19.5 80.5 100.0

Medium level 27.4 72.6 100.0

Superior level 28.3 71.7 100.0

Total 25.4 74.6 100.0

Rural Father’s education

Low level 22.7 77.3 100.0

Medium level 25.1 74.9 100.0

Superior level 30.6 69.4 100.0

Total 24.5 75.5 100.0

Source: HERD database 2012

We assumed that the performance obtained by students in upper secondary school is a strong predictor of the academic performance with the hypothesis that the disadvantaged students enrol at the university with weaker results.

Table 18: The relationship between the performance scholarships received in upper secondary school and the university

Lived until 14 year old Performance scholarship University Total

Yes No

% within Performance scholarship 9–12

Urban Performance scholarship 9–12

Yes 36.2 63.8 100.0

No 19.1 80.9 100.0

Total 25.8 74.2 100.0

Rural Performance scholarship 9–12

Yes 37.0 63.0 100.0

No 17.4 82.6 100.0

Total 25.1 74.9 100.0

Source: HERD database 2012

As we observe from the Table 18, the two variables predicting the academic achievement during upper secondary school and university periods are associated, fact confirmed by the chi-square tests. Finally, we tested the influence of the cultural capital through the student’s father educational level on the student’s integration process through the evaluation of the relations with the teachers and other university staff. These variables are subjective and synthetic but we consider that the students can properly evaluate their relationships with teachers and other university staff by comparing their expectations and experiences.

We can observe from the Table 19 that there is no association between the variables when analyzing the data regarding the students from the urban areas. For the students from rural areas, the chi-square test shows a result that confirms a relation between the two variables. The result can be explained by the presumption that, compared to the students from rural areas, the urban students’ habitus is less affected by their parents’ educational low level.

Table 19: The relationship between the father’s education level and the student’s relations with the teachers

Lived until 14 years old

Evaluate your relations with the teachers and the academic staff

Total No relations Bad relations Indiff erence Good

relations % within Father’s education

Urban Father’s education

Low level 12.8 3.4 45.1 38.7 100.0

Medium level 10.5 5.3 47.0 37.3 100.0

Superior level 12.3 4.6 42.6 40.5 100.0

Total 11.5 4.6 45.6 38.3 100.0

Rural Father’s education

Low level 13.6 2.6 47.8 35.9 100.0

Medium level 8.3 4.0 46.5 41.2 100.0

Superior level 13.5 2.7 31.1 52.7 100.0

Total 11% 3.3 45.7 40.0 100.0

Source: HERD database 2012

Measuring the father’s education level, that can influence the academic participation (Table 20), we found a weak relationship between the two variables regarding the data received from the students coming from urban areas. For the students from rural areas we found no evidence of a relationship between the father’s education and the academic participation.

As for a career projection, we discovered no evidence to support the premise that quitting academic studies is influenced by the residence. Abandoning the studies is, in Romania, more associated with a low SES expressed by a social scholarship; in Hungary we found no association between the two variables.

Table 20: The relationship between the father’s education and the participation

Lived until 14 years old

Academic participation Total under 10 participations between 10 and 14 participations between 15 and 19 participations more than 19 participations % within Father’s education

Urban Father’s education

Low level 5.8 59.7 31.1 3.4 100.0 Medium level 7.5 55.8 31.3 5.4 100.0 Superior level 12.5 48.4 32.1 7.1 100.0 Total 8.0 55.5 31.4 5.1 100.0 Rural Father’s education Low level 8.8 58.0 30.0 3.2 100.0 Medium level 7.3 57.7 29.7 5.2 100.0 Superior level 11.3 46.8 40.3 1.6 100.0 Total 8.3 56.9 30.7 4.0 100.0