worker, because Alfred couldn’t rely on just education alone. Alfred’s father had to sacrifice his own wants as well. Lubrano was able to go to college and move up in the ladder. But in his essay, “Bricklayer’s Boy,” after completing school Lubrano moves on to make almost the same salary as his father does (351). His father is angry and tells him that he breaks one of the “blue collar rules”: “Make as much money as you can, to pay for as good of a life as you can get” (Lubrano 351). He states that his father “figured an education—genielike and benevolent—would somehow rocket me into the consecrated trajectory of the upwardly mobile, and load some serious loot into my pockets” (Lubrano 351). This lower class and upper class tension is caused because although Lubrano receives a white collar education he is still attached to his blue collar world. Lubrano and Black both are similar in a way that they were both able to go against the odds and move a step closer to the “white collar” world. However, they both could not break the connection from their blue collar lives, Black with her language and attitude and Lubrano with his family and career choice. Black grows to become a teacher who helps the transition from blue collar to white collar go easier for the lower class students. Income is not the only determiner of class and happiness. Although Lubrano’s job paid very little he was living the upper class dream by doing what he loved to do.
Money does matter. From the evidence shown in Mike Rose’s book,
students are discriminated against by their families social class and in Jean Anyon’s essay students are taught differently between family incomes. Both Lubrano and Black were able to overcome the barrier that separated the privileged from the poor, but, especially in Black’s case, transitioning from a lower class education is a difficult journey. At a young age our brains start developing around the difficulty of the curriculums. To change would be difficult and only those who are best adept to change will succeed (which is most likely the upper class students). How much our family makes should not affect the quality of our education and it definitely should not depict what our future 96 Excellence in First-Year Writing 2012