Paths to Success - Beating the Odds in American Society. This item is unavailable.Paths to Success - Beating the Odds in American Society

Who would have thought that Joycelyn Elders, born into a family that chopped cotton and trapped raccoons to survive, would grow up to be Surgeon General of the United States? Or that Clarence Thomas, brought up by his barely literate grandfather, would someday be a Justice of the Supreme Court? Certainly not statisticians, who tell us that impoverished backgrounds are fairly accurate predictors of impoverished futures. This book seeks out the stories behind the exceptions: those who, against all odds, have made the American myth of rags-to-riches a reality. For more than ten years Charles Harrington and Susan Boardman explored the life histories of successful Americans of 40 to 55 years old, looking at those from poor homes, whose parents had not completed high school, and those from the middle class. Comparing the routes to success of these two groups - the one by various courses of their own construction, the other by a well-laid path - the authors are able to show where their efforts and qualities diverge, and where they coincide. Joycelyn Elders and Clarence Thomas are examples of the "pathmakers" of this work. While the book reveals certain consistencies between these pathmakers approaches and those of their middleclass counterparts, it also exposes striking differences between men and women, blacks and whites. These differences, described here, illuminate the ways in which opportunities, serendipities, and impediments intersect with personal resources, strategies, and choices to produce success where we least expect it.

An excellent exploratory study that examines the lives of one hundred Americans who achieved success in their careers. In studying this upwardly mobile population, the authors examine the factors that led to this achievement and, in the reporting, they allow the reader to have a rare glimpse of at least one population that 'beats the odds.' Whether children of poverty with uneducated parents or those from middle-class homes and educated parents, the stories of the 'Pathmakers' make for fascinating reading.--Yolanda T. Moses, President, City College of New York

"Paths to Success" is a stereotype-bursting book. It describes pathmakers who achieve by beating the odds that are stacked against them. These resilient people defy normative expectations. This book celebrates people who lie beyond the norm and indicates why social scientists should be concerned with analyzing coefficients of dispersion in behavior as well as determining normative patterns.--Charles Willie, Harvard Graduate School of Education

As a study of resiliency in highly successful adults, this study is unique and departs from mainstream research in the disciplines where the authors locate their work--namely, anthropology, sociology, and psychology...the present findings have implications, especially for educators, in that they illuminate issues in current policy debates and suggest directions for practice.--Helen M. Marks "Journal of Higher Education "

Paths to Success is a stereotype-bursting book. It describes pathmakers who achieve by beating the odds that are stacked against them. These resilient people defy normative expectations. This book celebrates people who lie beyond the norm and indicates why social scientists should be concerned with analyzing coefficients of dispersion in behavior as well as determining normative patterns.--Charles Willie, Harvard Graduate School of Education