In the film “ Homeless to Harvard ,” it features a real-life story involving a young girl, Liz Murray. Murray was a young and bright girl though she did not have the opportunity to attend a school like other children. Given her circumstances, she did not have any hopes of surviving in the real world. Growing up, Murray was marred by extreme cases of adversity resulting from her dark family life and education. She lived inside an unsanitary apartment in New York with her two drug-addicted parents and sister, leading her to be taken away by child welfare services at a tender age .
Nonetheless , the children's homes were not any better as she would witness many cases of bullying. During her teenage years, Murray mother is seen suffering from mental deterioration, and she has also become an alcoholic. Her parents are eventually evicted from their apartment whereby her father ends up being homeless while her mother moves in with Murray’s grandfather. Murray ends up living alone after she disagrees with her grandfather. She becomes homeless for some few weeks. Murray eventually learns of her mother’s demise. After her mother’s funeral, Murray decides to attend school, and this is when her life changes for the better (Melnad, 2013). However, while still searching for a school she was still homeless, and she encountered many rejections and finally decided to seek an alternative high school, The Humanities Preparatory Academy Chelsea, Manhattan.
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According to Davies (2010), for one to fully understand the developmental progression of a child, it is vital that the layers of ecological contexts surrounding the child and their transactions with the particular child must be clearly understood. As a result of this, researchers conducted various studies during the 1960s and noticed that once the children were exposed to certain levels of risk factors, they would affect their entire transition into adolescence and adulthood. The risk had various impacts on the children whereby some would bring about catastrophic disturbances, others were moderate, mild and others would sue the various risk factors to become stronger (Melnad, 2013). It is through this that such children were referred to as being resilient. Resilience is therefore defined as the ability of a child to recover from an extremely threatening condition and use the experience for psychological growth and development.
Resilience is a vital part of child development, and every child must achieve it. Therefore, the risk/resilience approach to child development is based on the ability of a child to overcome various risk factors and become resilient through using them as a stepping ladder to boost their psychological growth. Nonetheless, this is only achieved by having multiple support/protective factors, especially in a highly adverse environment. The three core risk factors that affect child development includes child, parental and environmental/community factors (Davies, 2010) . These three facets in addition to the protective factors have interactions that are bound to affect child development. In case a child has poor resilience abilities in relations to the three risk factors, their progress will be negatively impacted .
According to Laser and Nicotera (2011), individual protective factors are the characteristics of an individual that aid him/her in building a buffer in relation to the effects of adversity . These factors will help the individual in becoming more successful while living in an adverse environment. Murray’s internal assets included a commitment to learning. This is evidenced by the encyclopedias that she collected and read all of them. Despite not having a chance to attend school, Murray still was smart as she had a chance to read through various learning materials. Murray had positive values in that, despite her parents being drug addicts, she did not engage in the risky behaviors at an early age. At the children’s home, she did also participate in bullying as her peers. Her attributes include cognitive ability. Murray had effective decision-making skills and was street smart. She did not take any drugs while she lived on the streets and also with her parents.
Additionally, she had self-efficacy abilities. According to Laser and Nicotera (2011), self-efficacy allows an individual to have determination when faced with an extreme event and due to the situation to succeed in life. Murray was determined to succeed in life, and this is what saw her finally attending Harvard University. She had self-regulation abilities that allow one to have control over their behaviors and emotions. This is evidenced by Murray’s lack of engaging in bullying and drug taking while l iving on the streets. Murray had a positive outlook on life for despite being denied admission in various high schools, she remained optimistic that she will have a chance to join high school. Finally, this was possible, even though she was already 17 years old. Individual factors that made Murray more susceptible to hardships included isolation by her parents, lack of social bonding and early initiation to drug abuse from her parents.
A microsystem is made up individual-level factors and other additional factors that have a direct impact on a child’s development such as the family, school and neighborhood. Davies (2010) states that the role of parents in a family is to protect the children and provide an environment that will help them have a favorable opportunity for development. However, parenting that increases risks towards the development of a child narrows the normal functions of parenthood. In relation to Murray’s family, her parents had various risk factors that included substance abuse. Her parents would sell household items to get purchase cocaine and other drugs. Her parents were also unemployed an indication they did not have money to support their day to day activities and life. The only protective factor from her family was that there was a sense of family belonging. Despite the parents being drug addicts, they loved Murray and her sister. Murray w3as a truant and the affected her school life. The significant risk factors from the school microsystem are that the teachers did not care about the students. Murray had a difficult time making friends at school since she did not have enough clothes and the ones she had always smelt bad .
Nonetheless , after joining Prep, the protective factors included a sense belonging at school. The teachers at the school became Murray’s compass and family. There were also school mentoring programs that saw Murray joining various school committees. At Prep, she could make better friends and participate in social networking when she took a trip to Harvard with other students . The tricks factors in Murray neighborhood included lack of apartment repairs and gang activity in the community . The protective factors included a sense of belonging as people within her proximity accepted their living status.
A mesosystem is made up an interaction between the microsystems. The significant risk factors are that the neighborhood was not safe and drug and substance abuse was highly practiced . As a result, Murray parents would get the cocaine and other drugs from local drug dealers within the neighborhoods. Moreover, the schools within Murray’s area did not care about the students. This is evidenced by the high number of truants. Murray would sneak away from school with her friends and hide in friends apartments whose parents had gone to school for a whole day . The protective factors are that the parents knew the importance of education to their children and this is why they took them to school. Murray’s mother took her to a junior high school. The presence of schools in Murray’s neighborhood also indicated that the people wanted their children to get an education to make a better life for themselves.
The extreme is made up of indirect influences on children. Murray’s parent was unemployed, and this is seen from her mother’s poor upbringing, and she had to work as a prostitute to make ends meet. In the case of her father, he was a local drug dealer. Being unemployed indicates that her parents did not have the income to support the needs of the family adequately. Thus they lived a harsh life. The school administration in her junior high school was poor as it did not take note of its students and this is what made it easy for Murray to become a truant . The protective factors are that Murray’s mother was entitled to welfare following her legally blind status resulting from a degenerative eye disorder. This allowed Murray and her family to have access to abundant food during the first week of every month. Murray’s community was also manned by Child Welfare services whereby children would be taken into foster homes. At 13 years, Murray was taken by child welfare services whereby she lived for six months.
The macro system is made-up of the larger social environment influencing the development of a child. The major risk factor was poverty. Murray’s parents were not employed, and her neighborhood consisted of unemployed citizens who relied on selling of drugs and prostitution to make ends meet. The primary protective factor is that the drug trade was an illegal undertaking and anyone who was caught would spend some time in jail. As such, this limited the drug trade in Murray’s neighborhood. Moreover, the government had set up schools and child welfare services in her region to aid in the learning of children within the neighborhood .
After Murray’s mother was diagnosed with AIDS and tuberculosis, she went to live with her, and this saw the development of a mother-child relationship that had earlier been lost . In 1996, her mother died, and it is here that she underwent a turning point in her life. During the time she had spe4nt with her mother, she connected the lifestyles she had witnessed and how her mother ended up. She did not want to live the same lifestyle, and it is through this that she developed a sense of purpose. Murray decided to go back to school despite being homeless and her poor grades. She was later admitted to the Humanities Preparatory School, and this was the turning point in her life.
Even though Murray did not take drugs as her parents and some of her friends, she still became a truant. Murray would skip school and flee with her friends and stay at friends apartments for a whole day. Moreover, she tore a letter and threw the pieces into a dustbin after her school administrator wrote to her parents about skipping school. After her mother and father separated, Murray’s truancy worsened, and she would spend the whole day watching television and eating cornflakes. Using the risk/resilience framework, it highlights how a child can overcome the harsh adversities in their environment and end up using the challenges as a stepping ladder towards a better future. From the model, during the initial onset of the film, one can conclude that the main character, Murray will end up like her parents. Surprisingly, she ends up as a successful individual and even joins Harvard University. From this framework, it allows one to view Murray as being a resilient individual who did not succumb to her parents’ lifestyle.
References
Davies, D. (2010). Child development: A practitioner's guide . Guilford Press.
Laser, J. A., & Nicotera, N. (2011). Working with adolescents: A guide for practitioners . Guilford Press.
Melnad, K. (2013, Dec. 26). Homeless to Harvard [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGe3u5rLGQc
