Academic Struggles and Hitches: Listening to Voices of Children Born Out-of-Wedlock

Authors

  • Ma. Angelita S. Rabanal, RN, MSN, LPT, PhD

Abstract

This study concentrates on exploring the academic struggles and hitches of these children. It purposes
to ascertain if these children do experience difficulties in their educational undertakings brought about by the
non-marriage of their parents; and determine how these experiences are being mirrored in their academic lives.
The study utilized a qualitative-phenomenological approach voluntarily participated in by six college students
of the Cagayan State University. These participants were children left behind by their unmarried parents
having a family of their own already. The unprompted open-ended reflective journaling activity directly
related to the participant’s ‘no parent’ experiences in school were the primary data source. Informal dialogues
through semi-structured interviews and participant observations were also conducted. Secondary data were
also gathered from the participants’ significant others (guardians, teachers and friends). The students’ outputs
were interspersed to provide a distinctive quality to the overall outputs. From the analyses, seven themes
emerged: 1) parental absence 2) negative views; 3) surname confusion 4) economic instability; 5) physical
abuse; 6) social disengagement, and 7) self-harm. Nonetheless, through strong relational interactions with
their significant others, the participants were able to cope with the difficulties and problems they experience
in their schooling conveyed by being children born out-of-wedlock.

Published

2020-05-30

Issue

Section

Articles