Family Stability is Education Policy

Scholars Ian Rowe and Brad Wilcox, writing recently in The Wall Street Journal, identified a factor routinely omitted from discussions of student achievement: family structure.

When disparities appear in test scores, graduation rates or college admissions, policymakers typically blame school funding, teacher quality, poverty or, more recently, systemic discrimination. Some of those factors matter. But Rowe and Wilcox argue that we cannot honestly evaluate educational outcomes while ignoring the enormous influence of what happens in a child’s home before, during, and after the school day.

They are right.

I helped found Cornerstone Schools of Washington, D.C., nearly 30 years ago and later served as its principal and executive director. We created Cornerstone to provide children, predominantly from some of Washington’s poorest neighborhoods, with a Christ-centered, nurturing, and academically rigorous classical education.

Cornerstone demonstrated that a strong school can make an extraordinary difference. Dedicated teachers, high expectations, small classes, moral formation, and genuine love can change the direction of a child’s life.

But we also learned something education reformers are often reluctant to admit: A school cannot completely compensate for everything that has happened, or did not happen, during the other 18 hours of a child’s day or during the five or more years before that child enters our classrooms.

Teachers cannot retroactively read bedtime stories to a child who rarely encountered a book. They cannot erase years of unstable housing, family conflict, abandonment, violence, or neglect. They cannot always overcome the emotional consequences of watching adults cycle in and out of the household. Nor can they provide, within a six- or seven-hour school day, all the supervision, discipline, encouragement and security that committed two-parent households can provide throughout a child’s life.

That is not a criticism of single mothers or fathers. Many perform heroically, working multiple jobs and sacrificing everything for their children. Some children from single-parent homes thrive, while some children from two-parent homes suffer greatly.

Family structure is not destiny. It is, however, one of the most powerful influences on the resources, stability, and adult attention likely to be available to a child. Research has identified both greater financial resources and greater parental time as important advantages generally available in two-parent households.

For context, in my third year at Cornerstone, I had only four students in the entire school of more than 150 students who were being raised by their birth mother and birth father in the same home. Most were being raised by overwhelmed single mothers, grandmothers, or other single adults.

Research has repeatedly found that, on average, children growing up with a single parent fare worse across a range of educational and social outcomes than children raised in stable two-parent households. Researchers appropriately caution that income, parental education, family conflict and other characteristics explain some of these differences. But the relationship between family structure and children’s outcomes is too consistent and substantial to ignore.

The reasons are not mysterious. A stable two-parent household has two potential earners, two sources of supervision and two adults available to absorb life’s inevitable disruptions. A single parent must attempt to perform all those roles alone, an exhausting task at best.

That is why poverty and family structure should not be treated as competing explanations. Family structure frequently stands upstream from poverty.

Research has found a strong relationship between family composition and child poverty, while Brookings’ analysis has identified married parenthood as one of the strongest predictors of upward mobility for lower-income children.

At Cornerstone, we did not treat poverty as an abstract economic statistic. We saw its practical consequences when one overwhelmed parent was forced to do the work of two. Transportation problems became missed school meetings. Minor illnesses became family emergencies. Unpredictable work schedules left little time for homework, reading or conversation.

Then there is the concomitant trauma from instability that creates even steeper burdens.

A 2024 meta-analysis of 20 studies involving nearly 1.2 million children and adolescents found that adverse childhood experiences were associated with poor academic achievement, grade repetition, and increased need for special-education support.

Good schools, like Cornerstone, respond with structure, patience, counseling, and accountability. But teachers are educators, not magicians. They cannot erase a lifetime of trauma with a new curriculum, more spending or another professional-development seminar.

The broader implication of Rowe and Wilcox’s argument is that government should not merely spend more money treating the consequences of family instability. It should ask whether its own policies strengthen or weaken families.

Virginia provides a timely example.

The Commonwealth is establishing a large commercial marijuana market, with retail sales authorized to begin on July 1, 2027, and up to 350 retail-store licenses. This follows a dramatic expansion of legalized gambling. Virginia’s own Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission has documented the introduction of casinos, sports wagering, historical horse-race wagering and other forms of gaming in the Commonwealth. Virginia lawmakers have also considered legislation authorizing internet casino gaming.

Supporters emphasize tax revenue, personal freedom and the advantages of replacing illicit activity with regulated markets. Those are legitimate considerations, but they are not the only considerations.

Marijuana and gambling are not ordinary consumer products. Both carry risks of dependency or compulsive use, and the harm does not necessarily stop with the user; it can extend to children and the broader family.

A 2024 systematic review and meta-analysis of 63 studies involving more than 438,000 adolescents and young adults found cannabis use associated with lower grades, greater absenteeism and dropout, and reduced likelihood of high-school completion and postsecondary educational attainment. Earlier and more frequent use were generally associated with worse outcomes.

The evidence concerning problem gambling and families is similarly troubling. A systematic review of 35 studies found evidence linking parental problem gambling with negative outcomes for children, including psychological distress, family dysfunction and financial harms.

This does not mean every Virginian who uses marijuana or places a wager will become addicted, impoverished or neglectful. Most will not. But public policy cannot be designed only around moderate users. It must also consider those most vulnerable to addiction and the children who bear consequences they did not choose.

Virginia’s expansion of commercial marijuana and gambling risks increasing addiction, financial distress and family dysfunction, particularly among households already least able to absorb those costs. The Commonwealth may collect additional tax revenue but then spend even more public money addressing social costs associated with addiction, financial distress, family dysfunction and educational problems.

That is not a coherent family policy.

While government cannot manufacture the daily love, stability, sacrifice, and attention of a healthy family, it must do all it can to avoid hindering marriage, work, parental responsibility, and family stability. Virginia should certainly exercise caution when commercializing activities that can undermine family stability.

A sensible first step would be for the Virginia Department of Education to begin collecting and publishing family-composition data alongside student-performance data. Rowe and Wilcox specifically argue that educational outcomes should be examined by family structure so that policymakers can better understand the relationship between family structure and student achievement.

Virginia should lead the way — particularly as the Commonwealth simultaneously liberalizes access to marijuana and gambling.

Until the government recognizes that family stability is itself an education policy, it will continue to ask schools to solve problems they did not create and cannot solve alone.

Key Takeaways:

• Family stability is a major, often overlooked driver of student success. Stable two-parent households generally provide more income, supervision, time, and resilience, while family instability can contribute to poverty, trauma, and educational disadvantage before a child ever enters the classroom.
• Schools cannot fully compensate for what happens outside school. Great teachers and strong schools can transform lives, but they cannot retroactively provide years of reading, stability, parental attention, or relief from childhood trauma.
• Virginia should view family stability as part of education policy. Expanding commercial marijuana and gambling may increase risks of addiction, financial distress, and family dysfunction, while Virginia simultaneously spends more money trying to address the educational and social consequences.

Key Quote: “The broader implication of Rowe and Wilcox’s argument is that government should not merely spend more money treating the consequences of family instability. It should ask whether its own policies strengthen or weaken families.“

Derrick Max
Jefferson Forum

Derrick Max is Vice President of Policy at the Jefferson Forum and may be reached at dmax@jeffersonforum.org