Women receiving assistance from the social solidarity and cooperation foundation’s interpretations regarding education

This study aims to create a space for discussing how poor women who receive assistance from Social Assistance and Solidarity Foundations make sense of their education through their daily life experiences. The theoretical framework is grounded in Bourdieu's theory of habitus, capital and field; Sen's capability approach; and Edin and Kefalas's theory of prioritizing motherhood. A phenomenological design from qualitative research methods was adopted; data were collected through semi-structured interview forms and analyzed using phenomenological analysis. The study group consists of poor women who regularly receive assistance from Social Assistance and Solidarity Foundations. The main findings of the study show that women mostly interpret their own educational experiences as a “delayed,” “incomplete,” and “challenging” process; in contrast, they position their children's education as a strong “hope,” “salvation,” and “investment in the future.” This finding demonstrates that education, in the context of poverty, is not a singular or fixed phenomenon but rather a multilayered experience interwoven with maternal responsibilities, deferred selfhood, and social expectations. The study aims to contribute to the fields of social policy, adult education, and educational inequality, and includes recommendations for the development of capability-oriented, gender-sensitive educational programs for disadvantaged women.