Does divorce influence on educational achievement?

A blog entry on “The guardian” explained the situation of a sixteen year old girl whose parents were splitting up just before she took her A-level exams. The story goes the following way.

A few weeks ago, her parents told her they were getting a divorce. They had asked her sister to fly back home from London, so she could be the one who knew it first and kept it away from the girl as she had mock exams which she was preparing for. The situation at home had been lately full of “serious arguments and inevitable awkwardness”, although she describes that she was already mentally prepared for the idea of her parents divorcing. She really tried to distance herself from the family issues and kept her mind focused on the studying, but nevertheless that resulted as a difficult task. She states that “just because you're over the age of 16 it doesn't mean you're unaffected when your parents get divorced.” After the announcement, she went through a stressful and difficult time because she was having her exams while dealing with the family problems and it was difficult because she needed the grades that would help her for university. She tried to convince herself that she was okay, but turned on the other way and searched for help to her school nurse, who handled this kind of situations. The idea of sharing her thoughts to a ‘stranger’ gave her the strength to keep going and her emotional situation started to improve. When her father left, the house became quieter and her family time had been reduced, which made it easier for her to concentrate on her studies. She also had an everyday support from her mother, which she could afford as the only one that she had at home was her daughter.

Sociologically, this situation can be explained in different views. First of all this girl has lived all her life with her parents and her sister as a ‘traditional’ or ‘cereal packet’ family and now her parents have had a divorce after years of marriage following the trends in Britain that say that in the past 30 years, there has been an increase in the lone-parent families and divorce rates.

A divorce can affect negatively the educational achievement of the child as the home environment influences the studies, as he or she can feel rejected, alone and its emotional state can keep it away from achieving good grades (for example the girl needs them for getting into the university she wants). On the other hand if the child isn’t able to concentrate at home because of arguing of the parents it can also make a decrease in its level of achievement and not be able to obtain her life plans.

Montse Gironès
4 ESO Red