UF Researcher’s Experience With Poverty Provides Insight Into Welfare

November 25, 1996

GAINESVILLE— Cheryl Amey was a 30-year-old single mother of four living in poverty when she realized the only chance for a better life was to go back to school and get a college degree.

Today, six years later, the mother who depended on welfare and financial aid for support is a doctoral candidate in the University of Florida’s department of sociology, bringing a personal perspective to her research on poverty and minority issues that most in the academic world can only imagine. But, Amey is quick to point out her story should not be promoted as an example of how people on welfare can pull themselves out of poverty with just a little hard work and education.

“I had tons of resources to help me get started and stay in college,” Amey said. “Those resources just aren’t available to women today.”

Amey said welfare reform has, for the most part, eliminated the opportunities that contributed to her academic success. That success includes graduating from the University of North Carolina-Wilmington in 1992 with honors, earning her master’s degree in sociology from UF in 1994, again with honors, and a host of published academic articles. Amey’s most recent honor comes from the university’s Association of Academic Women, which awarded her the first Madelyn Lockhart Fellowship. To recognize the outstanding achievement and promise she has shown in her chosen field, Amey will receive $1,000 to assist in the dissertation phase of her doctoral degree.

As someone who studies the plight of women in poverty, Amey is concerned for those who will be forced to take jobs that don’t provide much dignity.

“Women on welfare don’t have access to education anymore,” Amey said. “Instead, they have to take jobs that require minimal skills and provide little opportunity.”

New welfare policies limit the number of women who can count full-time school as their work requirement to receive cash assistance and child care. In Florida, the limit is 20 percent of female welfare recipients, and that includes teen mothers still in high school.

Programs such as Project Independence, which was the boost Amey needed to pull herself out of poverty, have been replaced with Work and Gain Economic Self-sufficiency (WAGES).

Amey said there is no equal trade off.

“A program similar to Project Independence was supportive to the point that when my junky old car broke down, they could help fix it,” Amey said. “If it weren’t for the resources available to me back then, I’d still be on welfare today.”

Don Winstead, Florida’s welfare reform administrator, said Amey wouldn’t be able to stay on welfare long under today’s stricter limitations. The state’s reform, which went into effect Oct. 1, cuts people off welfare after two years. Winstead said while fewer women can choose college over a low paying job, WAGES includes programs that help those seeking to further their education once they are off welfare.

However, Amey said the education must be job-related. The new policies mandate that a woman going to school is required to work in addition to raising her children.

“What if she is flipping burgers?” Amey said. “Then what kind of school will these new programs allow her to attend?”

Amey’s research over the last four years has focused on issues of poverty, inequalities in welfare policy and minority health. She said obstacles within the structure of welfare prevent people from helping themselves.

Amey admits there have been many difficult and tiring days for her as a student. She recalls staying up until 3 a.m. to study so she could spend evenings with her kids. She also remembers having no electricity in the house when there wasn’t any money to pay the bill. She depended on friends, the school and the state to help her make it through the tough spells.

Today, she is remarried, her children are now teenagers and the oldest plans to attend Florida State University next year. Amey’s career goal is to help develop support programs that assist women with child care issues, building self esteem and continuing education.