Many of us who were first generation College kids had to experience the same struggles. Once away from the small rural community were College was only for maybe 2 to 3 people from most Graduation Classes,and they were usually kids that had a parent that did graduate from a 2 year or 4 year College,life sure changes,and must admit I did struggle and hung in their and made it work after 5 hard years working full and part time to pay my way.

Now living in Vegas,we see what you are talking about the lousy TeaBillie school system. If you have school aged children,you do not wont them in a Nevada Public School. Most of the Professional People send their children to Parochial Schools or Private Schools. The Public School System has a dropout rate of twenty percent. Just a preparatory school for Casino Workers and Retail Clerks.

When I moved to a rural community with a long history of logging and mill work. I was shocked to see the anti-education feeling people had for their own children. Some of it comes from fathers who do not want their children to do better than they did. It is a class consciousness that fears their children entering a higher class.

It also has to do with living with cynicism. If a parent lives with cynicism about their place in life and their child becomes educated and does well, the cynicism has to be replaced with the concept of one's own failure. Social customs such as early drinking, early pregnancies, trouble with the law are tolerated and encouraged as family values - the world view remains intact.

Teachers in such communities are very challenged and many times heartbroken when they see talented kids succumb to such pressures from families and peers. Other students from upper class play a role too.

for the most part, come from under-educated, anti-intellectual families that do not value education or trust the educated. There's a reason why so many "small-town kids" are overwhelmed and under-prepared for higher education. Their parents resist efforts to prepare them.

In the modern day and economy, even most of the anti-intellectual want their kids to further their education after high school. They just don't want them taught to think or to question anything, or to use "big fancy words" that extend beyond their parents' vocabulary, or to spend time reading instead of doing things with their hands. The constant mantras from those parents include:

"We didn't have to learn this when I was in school"/"We didn't do it this way"/etc., etc., etc.

"I never liked math/liked school/was good at _______" either," said with a little chuckle excusing a student who is struggling.

"You are way too hard on them. You guys just need to give them the basics and quit pushing."

"Little Freddy don't do homework; he's got too many chores to do on the ranch when he gets home. He don't have time for reading/writing/math."

"Little Freddy can't stay after school or come before school for extra help, either; we're too busy. He has barn chores."

"We'll be gone most of hunting season. Just send him some worksheets he can complete in the tent at night."

"She can't spend time studying for school this month. She's too busy studying for her hunter safety course." (Of course, I want them all to pass this one!)

"He don't need to be here everyday. Just send home the worksheets."

They assume that if their kids manage to squeak out a regular diploma from high school that they will be ready for college without managing to master all that "extra" that they didn't value. And so do their kids, until reality smacks them in the face.

I have never understood why much of the right is anti-education.

The Right is all about fear because that is what they feel when they do not understand something, or something does not fit in with what they have been led to think.
If you are educated, you are harder to control, for one. And worse, you are less likely to accept what you are told because that is what you have been told. You know Will Rogers "Herd of cats"?
Heave forbid someone can think for themselves, or has too many problems with the daily talking points because they are better educated. The Right doesn't like that. They prefer and operate on group think.
Is it any wonder the Right has denigrated Liberals for so long?
Liberals have a tendency to upset the neat world view of conservatives by bringing in a bit too many 'shades of gray' reality to their binary world for them to be able to handle properly... Until the talking points on that come out.