I recently started to read a book called From Rage To Hope by a woman named Crystal Kuykendall. She is a teacher and her book focuses on what public schools are teaching Black and Hispanic students as well as how they teach the material (amongst other things).
She claims that current school cirricula focuses on imparting knowledge that is extremely irrelevant to the survival of Black youth. The believes that the cirricula should be revised to foster an appreciation of all the positive components of the students' racial/cultural group - along with portraying their history accurately. Schools distort historical facts - i.e Columbus "discovering" America, Native Americans being portrayed as "savages". This cirricula focuses on "tradition" instead of truth.
Cirricula is also relevant when it builds on the students' cultural and nonacademic strenghts and teaches students how to use their respective strenghts to realize meaningful goals. She argues that Black students need to be groomed and prepared for careers that will bring them professional gratifacation and financial security - they shouldn't be put in vocational/technical schools or other low-level tracks that prepares them for menial work and dead-end jobs.
Kuyendall claims that current resegregation has created unequal educational opportunities for Black students. Blacks progress since the 1960s was eliminated during the 1990s. Resegretaion is contributing to the growing achievement gap. The percentages of Blacks in special education, alternative schools and vocational programs surpasses whites, even though Blacks are the monority. (16% of Blacks in total school enrollment in elementary, yet they make up 38% of the mentally retarded.) When you convince students they can succeed in school, they are more likely to obtain menial jobs or live a life of poverty.
Another issue is that fewer Blacks are striving to become teachers. The pool of Black males teachers in below 5%. Sex, race, social class and background affect the quality of a student-teacher relationship - with teachers responding more favorably to students of the same sex, race and social class as themselves.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
SAGE Article pt.2
Continuing to read the SAGE Article written by two professors at the University of Miami, I get more information about the four theories presented as to why there is an achievement gap.
In the victim-blame approach (or person-centered approach)there are three subclasses:
1. African-Americans lack the language skills needed for academic success, are unable to think in abstract terms, or have difficulty with perceptual discrimination.
2. African-Americans have personality deficits from the emotional scars of being discriminated against and living in poor conditions. Some of these deficits include the mistrust if authority, self depreciation, defensiveness and inward-directed stress reactions.
3. Motivational deficits are the cause of the poor performance of African Americans in academia.
The cultural difference approach reasons that the culture from which African- Americans originate, as compared to the culture in the school, primarily determines the student's self-concept (belief in your abilities). A positive self-concept is determined by how well or completely the behaviors shown by the person are congruent with their culture's norm. By putting someone in an enviornment (school) that is different or degrades their primary culture might result in the person not using the different rewards and punishments of the enviornment in evaulating theirself and in improving their behavior.
The cultural deficiency approach suggests that maladaptive and inappropriate behaviors and attitudes acquired from the impoverished backgrounds of African-Americans conflict with the attitude and behaviors that are needed to excel in school. It also suggests that because schools' cirricula are not adjusted to accommodate to African-American culture, African-Americans are performing poorly.
The social structure suggests that the school system's teachers relate to black students according to the negative stereotypes that the larger society holds of African-American students. Teachers have low expectations of their students and this have a negative impact on how the student believes in their ability to succeed in school, which therefore influences their performance.
Each theory I believe is a reason for the academic achievement gap in a school system such as Brookline, Newton, or Wellesley (towns that are a majority white) versus a school system such as Boston, Lawrence, or Lynn (a city where minorities are the majority).
In the victim-blame approach (or person-centered approach)there are three subclasses:
1. African-Americans lack the language skills needed for academic success, are unable to think in abstract terms, or have difficulty with perceptual discrimination.
2. African-Americans have personality deficits from the emotional scars of being discriminated against and living in poor conditions. Some of these deficits include the mistrust if authority, self depreciation, defensiveness and inward-directed stress reactions.
3. Motivational deficits are the cause of the poor performance of African Americans in academia.
The cultural difference approach reasons that the culture from which African- Americans originate, as compared to the culture in the school, primarily determines the student's self-concept (belief in your abilities). A positive self-concept is determined by how well or completely the behaviors shown by the person are congruent with their culture's norm. By putting someone in an enviornment (school) that is different or degrades their primary culture might result in the person not using the different rewards and punishments of the enviornment in evaulating theirself and in improving their behavior.
The cultural deficiency approach suggests that maladaptive and inappropriate behaviors and attitudes acquired from the impoverished backgrounds of African-Americans conflict with the attitude and behaviors that are needed to excel in school. It also suggests that because schools' cirricula are not adjusted to accommodate to African-American culture, African-Americans are performing poorly.
The social structure suggests that the school system's teachers relate to black students according to the negative stereotypes that the larger society holds of African-American students. Teachers have low expectations of their students and this have a negative impact on how the student believes in their ability to succeed in school, which therefore influences their performance.
Each theory I believe is a reason for the academic achievement gap in a school system such as Brookline, Newton, or Wellesley (towns that are a majority white) versus a school system such as Boston, Lawrence, or Lynn (a city where minorities are the majority).
Monday, March 14, 2011
SAGE Article pt. 1
I'm currently reading an article titled, "Discovering Self: Relationships Between African Identity and Academic Achievement." It's by written by two professors at the University of Miami.
First, the professors talked about what individual academic performance is - It's compared to a standard to determine a person's level of accomplishment or success. In America, it's usually measured by comparing Black academic success to White American success. Tests show that African-Americans often score lower on reading, vocabulary and math exams as compared to whites.
It's been noted that tests that measure intelligence according to this standard may be skewed to primarily measure the learning experiences of white middle-class Americans are aren't a valid measure of intelligence in Blacks.
The authors mention several different stats including, "The reading and math skills of a 17-year old black students are comparable to those of 13-year old." "A black boy today has a 1 in 4 chance of dropping out of school before high school graduation and 1 in 12 chance of graduation from college."
The authors then give four possible reasons for the poor performance amongst African-Americans in school. I believe ALL these reasons ARE causes for the academic achievement gap in a town such as Brookline, versus the city of Boston. The four reasons offered are: the victim-blame approach, the cultural difference approach, the cultural deficiency approach, and the social structural approach.
The victim-blame approach or the person-centered approach, presumes that a person's low academic performance is a consequence of the individual or of the deficiencies of his or her life experiences.
The cultural deficiency approach suggests that maladaptive and inappropriate behaviors and attitudes acquired from the impoverished backgrounds of African-Americans conflict with the attitude and behaviors that are needed to excel in school.
The cultural difference approach suggests that because schools' curricula aren't adjusted to accommodate the African-American culture, African-American students are performing poorly.
The social structural approach suggests that the school system's teachers relate to black students according to the negative stereotypes that the larger society holds of African-American students.
The article goes more into each theory (and I will get to these in my next post). But I believe the theories offered here are the EXACT reasons for the gap in Brookline, as opposed to the gap in Boston Public Schools (which I believe is more or less due to insufficient funds in the school system and home/personal issues that interfere with learning in the classroom.)
First, the professors talked about what individual academic performance is - It's compared to a standard to determine a person's level of accomplishment or success. In America, it's usually measured by comparing Black academic success to White American success. Tests show that African-Americans often score lower on reading, vocabulary and math exams as compared to whites.
It's been noted that tests that measure intelligence according to this standard may be skewed to primarily measure the learning experiences of white middle-class Americans are aren't a valid measure of intelligence in Blacks.
The authors mention several different stats including, "The reading and math skills of a 17-year old black students are comparable to those of 13-year old." "A black boy today has a 1 in 4 chance of dropping out of school before high school graduation and 1 in 12 chance of graduation from college."
The authors then give four possible reasons for the poor performance amongst African-Americans in school. I believe ALL these reasons ARE causes for the academic achievement gap in a town such as Brookline, versus the city of Boston. The four reasons offered are: the victim-blame approach, the cultural difference approach, the cultural deficiency approach, and the social structural approach.
The victim-blame approach or the person-centered approach, presumes that a person's low academic performance is a consequence of the individual or of the deficiencies of his or her life experiences.
The cultural deficiency approach suggests that maladaptive and inappropriate behaviors and attitudes acquired from the impoverished backgrounds of African-Americans conflict with the attitude and behaviors that are needed to excel in school.
The cultural difference approach suggests that because schools' curricula aren't adjusted to accommodate the African-American culture, African-American students are performing poorly.
The social structural approach suggests that the school system's teachers relate to black students according to the negative stereotypes that the larger society holds of African-American students.
The article goes more into each theory (and I will get to these in my next post). But I believe the theories offered here are the EXACT reasons for the gap in Brookline, as opposed to the gap in Boston Public Schools (which I believe is more or less due to insufficient funds in the school system and home/personal issues that interfere with learning in the classroom.)
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Final Reading Post for: In Scnools We Trust. (100 pages)
I've finally concluded in reading , In Schools We Trust by Deborah Meier. The book focused on the American school system and standardized tests more than anything, but I was able to extract the information she had on the achievement gap.
In my final reading Meier makes more points about the achievement gap. She says there are studies that state lower-class children who've lived in particularly harsh circumstances, weren't able to experience playful experiences where conceptual and abstract thought derived - thus these children weren't able to get a basis of higher level thinking from a young age. Meier believes this to be a stretch, but overall she agrees with it.
She believes that, "the best way to improve test scores was to do for all children even more what we did for the wealthy children - and that play was a vehicle for strong intellectual development in the young, regardless of class or race. What was good for the rick was best for the poor too - only more so."
Others believe that the relationship between children, school and their families needs to be stronger and more aligned. Children came to school with natural talents and skills that schools don't build upon and make stronger. Poverty plays a constraint on young minds.
Another interesting point Meier made was that children on average about 10 new words per day, regardless of race or class. In the classroom at the school she taught at, African-American students didn't talk or participate much in class, but outside of class (at recess, or with their families) they talked a lot, using the words - language is a strength in the Black community. Meier believes that this isn't a surprising finding because of how "important storytelling, verbal eloquence and wordplay was in the black community."
Yet she contradicts herself by insinuating that language is a reason that minority students fall behind their white peers. When she taught students in central Harlem, she noticed that some weren't able to recognize homonyms, homophones, and rhyming words because they didn't match the children's own dialects. Words like "pin" and "pen" sounded the same even though they have different meaning and spellings. Teachers saw these children as needing to be put in special education classes. Behavior at home vs. behavior in the classroom is an issue as well. Some students are unaware of how to act act school, but at home they resort to doing "anything" to get attention - so at school many (boys of any race) act out and defiant. The polar opposite can happen as well. Some students are unaware of the rules and in result, don't talk in class or use extreme caution.
Another point Meier makes that I agree with is, "Tests under predict actual achievement in life for women, African-Americans, Latinos and all low-income people, and they over predict the success for the wealthy and white and male." I believe this to be true with SAT and ACT exams as well. She claims that these tests cater to people of different races and therefore people taking the exams will get different answers and therefore different scores. The test score gap is something we've invented and can un-invent. Meier also says that tests are a form of inter generational wealth transfer."
Studies also show that minority students tend to underestimate their answers on standardized tests and change their answers frequently. Also, black students tend to do worse on standardized tests when the stakes are highest. Also, there is a skill-set that is needed to be successful on the SAT (most of the time). Understanding how the tests works, learning how to make educated guesses, etc. Students who are able to afford SAT Prep classes and private tutors are more likely to do better on these exams because they have strategy.
In my final reading Meier makes more points about the achievement gap. She says there are studies that state lower-class children who've lived in particularly harsh circumstances, weren't able to experience playful experiences where conceptual and abstract thought derived - thus these children weren't able to get a basis of higher level thinking from a young age. Meier believes this to be a stretch, but overall she agrees with it.
She believes that, "the best way to improve test scores was to do for all children even more what we did for the wealthy children - and that play was a vehicle for strong intellectual development in the young, regardless of class or race. What was good for the rick was best for the poor too - only more so."
Others believe that the relationship between children, school and their families needs to be stronger and more aligned. Children came to school with natural talents and skills that schools don't build upon and make stronger. Poverty plays a constraint on young minds.
Another interesting point Meier made was that children on average about 10 new words per day, regardless of race or class. In the classroom at the school she taught at, African-American students didn't talk or participate much in class, but outside of class (at recess, or with their families) they talked a lot, using the words - language is a strength in the Black community. Meier believes that this isn't a surprising finding because of how "important storytelling, verbal eloquence and wordplay was in the black community."
Yet she contradicts herself by insinuating that language is a reason that minority students fall behind their white peers. When she taught students in central Harlem, she noticed that some weren't able to recognize homonyms, homophones, and rhyming words because they didn't match the children's own dialects. Words like "pin" and "pen" sounded the same even though they have different meaning and spellings. Teachers saw these children as needing to be put in special education classes. Behavior at home vs. behavior in the classroom is an issue as well. Some students are unaware of how to act act school, but at home they resort to doing "anything" to get attention - so at school many (boys of any race) act out and defiant. The polar opposite can happen as well. Some students are unaware of the rules and in result, don't talk in class or use extreme caution.
Another point Meier makes that I agree with is, "Tests under predict actual achievement in life for women, African-Americans, Latinos and all low-income people, and they over predict the success for the wealthy and white and male." I believe this to be true with SAT and ACT exams as well. She claims that these tests cater to people of different races and therefore people taking the exams will get different answers and therefore different scores. The test score gap is something we've invented and can un-invent. Meier also says that tests are a form of inter generational wealth transfer."
Studies also show that minority students tend to underestimate their answers on standardized tests and change their answers frequently. Also, black students tend to do worse on standardized tests when the stakes are highest. Also, there is a skill-set that is needed to be successful on the SAT (most of the time). Understanding how the tests works, learning how to make educated guesses, etc. Students who are able to afford SAT Prep classes and private tutors are more likely to do better on these exams because they have strategy.
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