Kathleen Weiler's article discusses in full detail the roles of Okie children during the Dust Bowl Migration. According to Weiler, California's Department of Education during this time sought to instill a more progressive education system throughout the state. For the Okies and other families in rural areas, teachers were employed to live in these areas to ensure that all children regardless of social class could receive an education, which presented a new probelm for California's Department of Education because they were forced to hire more teachers, and during a time like the Depression, funding was difficult to come by. Furthermore, the migratory nature of Okie families made it difficult for the state to enforce laws that attempted to keep children in schools. Since most families followed the crops, children would often not attend school at all, or just for a short period of time. Even so, most children would take on the role of both student and laborer. Some ranchers would allow children to go to school for a few hours a day and pick cotton before or after classes. It is worth mentioning that this article also discusses the hostility local parents subjected migrant families to. It is made clear in Grapes of Wrath that the Okies (and therefore the Joads) are not receieved well. Many of the local parents whose children attended the same schools as migrant children feared diseases and overall differences. They also viewed these children, who had been nothing more than poor farmers even before coming to California, as "retarded", because they had not been properly/well educated in their home states. It is not surprsing when Weiler adds how most Okie children enjoyed being in school because it was not as laborious as working in the fields. Weiler's article is a decent reflection of what the roles of children like Ruthie and Winfield Joad were upon creating their new lives in California. It is odd Steinbeck doesn't mention schools for the children at all, although his accounts of Ruthie and Winfield are not far off, as they spend most of their time laboring alongside the family. Regardless, this article demonstrates that in reality, children like the Joads would have had the option to attend school. Moreover, it was nearly seen as an expectation, meaning some children who had possibly never attended school before starting anew in California may take on a new role as a student for the first time in their lives-- a brand new experience all in its own.