In the essay, 'Achievement of Desire', Richard Rodriguez describes the life of a scholarship boy and how it is very hard to balance an academic life and living the life of being in a working class family. Rodriguez describes himself as a scholarship boy, term from Richard Hoggart, which means he excels through his intellect, always successful and always unconfident (599). He was always on top of his class regardless of his home life, coming from very little schooling parents. Through the struggles of Rodriguez advancing himself and adjusting to the environment at home he starts feeling like he's losing connection with his family when he goes off to college. Education was changing him. Rodriguez had became a student with the influences from Richard Hoggart, he experienced his classroom surroundings, and he moved himself away from the past.
Rodriguez became a student when he finally realized, years later, that he couldn't forget that schooling was starting to separate him from the life he enjoyed before becoming a student (598). He strives to be just like his teachers. When he reached the third grade he became more tactful, devoted himself to his studies, bookish and ambition set him apart. Just from the third grade, he understood enough. The influence of Richard Hoggart's 'The Uses of Literacy', he learned that there were other students like him. Hoggart says that "advancing in his studies, the boy notices that his Mother and Father have not changed as much as he has. That becomes very ironic because, Rodriguez does notices this. Hoggart is a big part of the life that Rodriguez because his 'The Uses of Literacy' tells it all. Although, he became a student, he will never truly reach his goal of being "knowledgeable".
Rodriguez' experience around his classroom surroundings, that many working class children would not have, influenced him to go home and see his parents of life in a different perspective that a teacher would oppose.
