<p>“The fundamental issue, in my mind, is the culture and value system. Otherwise, how do you explain the success of Chinese kids whose parents also work multiple jobs to support a family and who do not speak English well enough to “work” the system on behalf of their children? Being a teenage mom and dropping out of school is simply not in the repertoire in these families. I am sure there are some too, but we are talking about a big picture, not individual cases.”</p>
<p>Looking at the bigger picture would entail to include other Asian ethnic groups, and especially the groups that share more attributes with Mexican immigrants. Think about an agrarian population with poor parental level of education. How do Hmongs and Laotians compare to Mexicans? How do the subgroups that suffer from poor acculturation do? </p>
<p>Simply stated it takes several generations to break the vicious cycles of poverty and substandard education. And, fwiw, looking at the performance of Native and African Americans, one could safely assume that our society has done little to nothing to help the less fortunate rise.</p>