Vibrant Ethnic Enclaves Offer Enrichment for Immigrant Kids


Date: December 16, 2002
Contact: Meg Sullivan ( megs@college.ucla.edu )
Phone: 310-825-1046

The more economically vital an immigrant neighborhood, the greater the chances of academic success for the children who live there, suggests a new report by a UCLA sociologist.

"Incredible as it may seem, a vibrant ethnic restaurant scene or an abundance of recreational services aimed at a specific immigrant group may signal a promising learning environment for kids from that group," said Min Zhou, who reveals her findings in the latest issue of California Policy Research Center Briefs. "These attractions tend to draw middle-class families from the suburbs, keeping them engaged in inner-city neighborhoods and creating a demand in the neighborhood for a whole range of enrichment programs designed for immigrant kids."

Zhou, a professor of sociology in UCLA's College of Letters and Science, spent two years pounding the pavement in three Los Angeles immigrant neighborhoods: Chinatown, Koreatown and the predominately Latino Pico Union District. After close observation and nearly 100 interviews with adolescents, parents, business owners, social workers and community leaders, Zhou found little difference in the number or kind of nonprofit organizations providing youth-oriented services in these neighborhoods.

However, pronounced differences emerged in the neighborhoods' business climates, particularly with regard to for-profit services delivered by immigrants for children of the same ancestry.

Of the three neighborhoods, Koreatown offered the most child-friendly environment — at least for kids of Korean ancestry — with more than 30 different Korean-run businesses offering after-school services, including karate courses, piano lessons, tutoring services and preparation for college placement exams. In Chinatown, Zhou found only six enrichment programs operated by businessmen of Chinese ethnicity.  In Pico Union, she found no private enrichment programs operated by immigrants of the neighborhood's predominant ethnicity — Mexican and Central American.

"Children and adolescents who are involved in supervised after-school activities in their own neighborhoods tend to do better in school and be more ambitious about their college plans and future careers, and have a clearer sense of purpose than those who are not so involved," said Zhou, whose study was published Dec. 16. "But cultural barriers appear to prevent immigrant children from taking advantage of enrichment and extracurricular activities not specifically aimed at them.  So the availability of these resources seems to be key to their academic success."

Although additional research would be required to establish a firm causal link, the power of a vibrant ethnic enclave may help explain variations in academic achievement that have long perplexed educators, she said. In the only high school attended by children from all three neighborhoods, Asian children scored considerably higher on standardized tests than Latino children, Zhou found. Across the Los Angeles Unified School District, Asians were three times less likely to drop out than Latinos. In neither case were figures available that would have allowed Zhou to compare achievement between students of Chinese and Korean ancestry, although she plans to do so in a future study.

"In the past, we've tended to chalk up differences in achievement to cultural differences, but we really need to look more closely at variations in neighborhood resources and how they may contribute to academic success," she said.

While being able to afford for-profit extracurricular services remained a significant challenge for Koreatown's predominately working-class Korean parents, the abundance and popularity of these services appeared to create "an environment for learning," with prominent advertisements touting the importance of education on storefronts and in ethnic newspapers, Zhou found.

"Even garment workers said they were stretching their limited resources to pay for the supplemental education — it was just the thing to do."

Indeed, Koreatown's extracurricular services proved so attractive that they ended up drawing middle-class immigrant families from outlying suburbs, Zhou found. While suburban children attended immigrant-specific extracurricular activities, their parent took advantage of such immigrant-specific amenities as ethnic food stores or golfing ranges frequented by other Korean immigrants. The families also retained connections to ethnic churches and business and professional groups in the neighborhood.

"Because of the plethora of ethnically specific businesses and services in Koreatown, immigrants never fell out of the habit of driving to the area once they moved to the suburbs, so they didn't think twice about returning for enrichment for their children," she said.

In addition to providing a shot in the arm for the neighborhood's economy, the pattern tended to promote beneficial mixing between the enclave's working-class residents and the middle-class immigrant families from outlying suburbs, Zhou found. Even immigrants too poor to avail themselves of for-profit enrichment services ended up crossing paths with these suburbanites in ethnic shops, restaurants and churches.

"Suburban families return to the neighborhood with their better cars and clothes, and working-class children come to appreciate the connection between education and doing well," Zhou said. "The middle class serves as an immediate role model for these kids. The adults, meanwhile, were able to share information and contacts with these suburbanites, who also brought their know-how to such local institutions as churches, making them much resourceful places."

But Koreatown's benefits appeared to extend only to children of Korean ancestry.  Zhou found scant evidence that the neighborhood's Latino residents avail themselves of Korean-run private extracurricular activities. Latinos also steered clear of the only private extracurricular activities in the Pico-Union neighborhood, a pair of businesses owned and operated by Korean immigrants, not people of Mexican and Central American ancestry.

"No matter how conveniently located, extracurricular activities aimed at immigrant children really have to be ethnically specific to gain a wide following," Zhou said.

While Zhou found thriving commercial districts in both Chinatown and the Pico Union District, neither ethnic enclave has so far reached the stature of Koreatown, which is a destination for immigrants from as far away as Orange County.

Zhou found that Latinos from outside the inner city travel to Pico Union from elsewhere in Los Angeles, including the suburban San Fernando Valley, but few of these shoppers were middle class.

"As a result, residents really don't have access to role model that drives home the value of getting an education and doing well," Zhou said.

One stumbling block may be the ethnic make-up of the providers of businesses and services in Pico Union, Zhou said. Unlike Koreatown, co-ethnics — or immigrants from the same homelands as the shoppers — did not have a lock on commerce and services. The neighborhood's small retail shops and restaurants were more likely to be run by Middle-Easterners, Koreans or other Asians and South Americans than Mexicans or Central Americans, who constitute the majority of the neighborhood's residents.

"To develop an ethnic business or service that draws from a large area, you really have to know the culture, and most of these business operators lacked this background, which constrained their businesses," Zhou said. "Successful Latinos aren't returning to the neighborhood because there's little to return for."

Business operators who were not Mexican or Central American were also more likely to live outside the neighborhood, taking with them resources that might have otherwise have supported such neighborhood institutions as churches and business associations.

While immigrants of Chinese ancestry tended to own and operate Chinatown's businesses and services, the neighborhood did not enjoy the same "critical mass" of development as Koreatown, Zhou found. As a result, the enclave drew fewer middle-class suburbanites than Koreatown. Without their support, the range of businesses operating in Chinatown continues to decline.

When the suburbanites did seek out extracurricular activities, they tended to head east to the more economically vibrant ethnic enclave of Monterey Park, where more affordable rents and abundant parking are attracting immigrant-run goods and services, including businesses that offer enrichment to children of immigrants from China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Southeast Asia. In a preliminary survey, Zhou found more than 30 Chinese-run businesses offering extracurricular activities, and these businesses appear to be attracting children from Chinatown and elsewhere.

"Monterey Park in recent years has kind of captured the energy that comes with a vibrant business community," Zhou said.

Zhou's research was funded by a grant from California Policy Research Center's Policy Research Program. The Brief is available online at www.ucop.edu/cprc/neighborhoods/pdf or by calling (510) 643-9328.

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