Baker's Elementary School in Halifax County, North Carolina, has an all-black, rural student population, about 52 percent of whom live with both parents, 32 percent with one parent (mother only) and 16 percent with their grandparents. Data on the students' academic achievement indicated that in the language arts area, children from one parent families (mother only) tended to score lower than children living with both parents or with their grandparents. The findings suggest that while living with the mother only has an unfavorable effect on children's academic achievement, father absence does not seem to make a difference, since children who lived with their grandparents did as well as those who lived with both parents. (MJL)