There are many such examples in the real world. That's not stuff from the movies. I don't think these things get reported in US but in India we see this in the news all the time. You can make a generic google search[1] and find tons of such people.
This doesn't counter my point through. From the first link[1]
> "I could not study because of financial problems, so I thought I must send my children to school and wipe out the darkness from their lives,"
> "I got tremendous support from my school teachers," he said.
This is exactly what i said. Environment of achievement is more important. "poor" doesn't mean just lack of financial resources. you cannot simply overcome lack of parental and social investment and care by reading a SAT book.
> I would say the environment, social expectations, exemplars within family/friends, peers ect matter more than a book.
I think every school, has its "smart kids" who define their identities by their academic achievement, and who seek to ace every test. It's their way of standing out and being special so they try extra hard to keep it that way.
Unfortunately they often tend to be introverts which colleges want less than overachievers in other areas. Except for the science/technology departments, who were probably overruled by other departments if decisions like abandoning test scores are made.
If it's being reported in international media I would guess it's still newsworthy enough to not be a regular occurrence. Like India is huge so you'll find a steady stream of events that are common enough to be frequent in absolute terms, but still unusual in proportional terms.
> "I could not study because of financial problems, so I thought I must send my children to school and wipe out the darkness from their lives,"
> "I got tremendous support from my school teachers," he said.
This is exactly what i said. Environment of achievement is more important. "poor" doesn't mean just lack of financial resources. you cannot simply overcome lack of parental and social investment and care by reading a SAT book.
> I would say the environment, social expectations, exemplars within family/friends, peers ect matter more than a book.
1. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-32791175