Research-Driven and Insightful
Books by Ilana M. Horwitz
Burnt Out and Left Behind:
Lost Boys, Exhausted Girls, and the Broken Promise of College
Why working-class youth don’t finish college―and what can make the difference.
Headlines proclaim that girls are displacing boys in college. But that’s not the whole story. Drawing on a landmark decade-long study of more than three thousand young Americans and the personal stories behind the numbers, Ilana M. Horwitz and Kaylee T. Matheny reveal that among working-class families, boys disengage early from school, disconnecting from the adults and institutions that could keep them on track. While girls persist through school longer, they are slowly worn down by the competing demands of work and family. The result: Fewer than one in five working-class youth earn a college degree, regardless of gender.
Whether working-class kids earn a degree isn’t simply about aspirations, finances, or biology. It’s about how the adults and institutions surrounding young people either anchor the path to a degree or make the climb impossible. Burnt Out and Left Behind is about the nurses, teachers, and engineers we never got because we left young people to navigate college on their own―and what becomes possible when someone is there to guide their way.
The Entrepreneurial Scholar: A New Mindset for Success in Academia and Beyond (Skills for Scholars)
An invaluable guide for scholars stifled by the traditional academic route
In the increasingly competitive world of academia, simply mastering your discipline is no longer enough to guarantee career success or personal fulfillment. The Entrepreneurial Scholar challenges scholars at all stages—from doctoral students to tenured professors—to break free from conventional academic pathways by adopting an entrepreneurial mindset. What opportunities can you create based on who you are, what you know, and who you know?
Drawing on her experiences in higher education, start-ups, and management consulting, as well as interviews with a range of academics and entrepreneurs, Ilana Horwitz provides a road map for those stifled by traditional academic norms and expectations. This book calls on scholars to create ideas—not just consume them. It offers strategies to thrive in academia with limited resources and in the face of uncertainty. Embracing an entrepreneurial mindset entails viewing yourself as a knowledge producer, enhancing collaboration, creatively identifying resources, and effectively sharing your ideas.
Horwitz empowers all scholars—particularly women and first-generation, low-income, and BIPOC individuals—to see themselves as proactive agents in their educational and career trajectories, despite structural constraints, unclear expectations, or unresponsive advisors. With actionable advice, real-world applications, and inspiring success stories, this guide is vital for anyone aspiring to excel within and beyond the ivory tower.
Published by Princeton University Press.
“At first blush, the realms of scholarship and entrepreneurship may seem in tension, even oxymoronic. In this illuminating book, Ilana Horwitz details the many links between these practices and, in the process, illuminates both.”
Howard Gardner
Author of Frames of Mind and coauthor of The Real World of College
“Ilana Horwitz shows how an entrepreneurial mindset can help scholars enhance their reach and impact. She offers an inspiring vision for the roles of scholars and scholarship in today’s world.
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Daniel R. Porterfield
College to Activate Lifelong Growth
About The Book
God, Grades, and Graduation: Religion's Surprising Impact on Academic Success
Winner of the distinguished book award from the american sociological association’s religion section
The surprising ways in which a religious upbringing shapes the academic lives of teens
It’s widely acknowledged that American parents from different class backgrounds take different approaches to raising their children. Upper and middle-class parents invest considerable time facilitating their children’s activities, while working class and poor families take a more hands-off approach. These different strategies influence how children approach school. But missing from the discussion is the fact that millions of parents on both sides of the class divide are raising their children to listen to God. What impact does a religious upbringing have on their academic trajectories?
Drawing on 10 years of survey data with over 3,000 teenagers and over 200 interviews, God, Grades, and Graduation offers a revealing and at times surprising account of how teenagers’ religious upbringing influences their educational pathways from high school to college. Dr. Ilana M. Horwitz estimates that approximately one out of every four students in American schools are raised with religious restraint. These students orient their life around God so deeply that it alters how they see themselves and how they behave, inside and outside of church.
This book takes us inside the lives of these teenagers to discover why they achieve higher grades than their peers, why they are more likely to graduate from college, and why boys from lower middle-class families particularly benefit from religious restraint. But readers also learn how for middle-upper class kids–and for girls especially–religious restraint recalibrates their academic ambitions after graduation, leading them to question the value of attending a selective college despite their stellar grades in high school. By illuminating the far-reaching effects of the childrearing logic of religious restraint, God, Grades and Graduation offers a compelling new narrative about the role of religion in academic outcomes and educational inequality.
Published by Oxford University Press.