Equally Inclusive to All – Connie Hahne

The newspaper heading every week for the last 20 years could have read as follows, “Education leaders looking for a fix to student underachievement!” Placement of the blame would most likely change weekly.  Ideas for educational reform include more funding, better teachers, smaller class sizes, Common Core Standards and more rigorous assessments. Does a fix really exist within the walls of the school building? How inclusive of all students are the present educational reforms?

I believe most educators and administrators are unaware of or understand how racism affects students’ ability to receive an equal and fair education in today’s schools.  Racism in not an issue of the past, nor was it a passing problem resolved during the Civil Rights Movement.  According to scientist and paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould, “Racial prejudges may be as old as recorded human history.”(p.32)  “All American culture heroes embraced racial attitudes that would embarrass public-school myth makers.” In his book, The Mismeasure of Man. Gould identifies Thomas Jefferson, Plato, and Benjamin Franklin as scholars that published articles about the inferiority of people labeled in present times as minorities.  American school age children learn about these men as the country’s founding fathers, greatest inventors, and philosophers that shaped ways of thinking and living today.  Many contemporaries may state that their racial views hold no detriment on modern society. On the contrary, looking at the current state of our school systems and the struggling students which have been identified as low-income, minority, at risk, and English language learners; it is evident that past racial beliefs from these American cultural heroes has seeped down into school practices, teaching methodologies, and mainstream beliefs about student achievement and behavior.

In his article, Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Ingredients for Critical Teacher Reflection, Professor Tyrone C. Howard refers to DuBois'(1903) prediction that racial issues would plague the 20th century is even more unsurpassable in the 21st century. All data on student achievement or lack thereof, directly segregates levels of academic success between racial groups.  The dominate culture scoring the highest and the minority groups still struggling and filling up the seats in the alternative placement and special education classrooms.  “Between 1990 and 2012, the educational attainment rate of 25- to 29-year-olds who received at least a high school diploma or its equivalent increased for Whites (from 90 to 95 percent), Blacks (from 82 to 89 percent), Hispanics (from 58 to 75 percent), and Asians/Pacific Islanders (from 92 to 96 percent). The percentage of Whites who received at least a high school diploma or its equivalent remained higher than that of Blacks and Hispanics.” (NCES 2013).

To increase the quality of education for non-dominate culture and non-mainstream students, schools and classrooms need to embrace alternative pedagogy that is inclusive of all students with assessments that are nonbiased to any specific group of students. (Garcia and Ortiz, 2008) Educational reform includes teaching both experienced and new teachers how to best work with diverse populations of students. “Teachers critically analyze important issues such as race, ethnicity, and culture, and recognize how these important concepts shape the learning experience for many students. More specifically, teachers must be able to construct pedagogical practices that have relevance and meaning to students’ social and cultural realities.”(Howard 2011). Students are viewed as valued contributors in the classroom.  The role of learner and teacher bounces back and forth between students and teacher.

True mindfulness, acceptance of a problem, extensive education, and retraining of educators and policy makers are possibly the only ways to break the cycle of centuries long racism.  Martin Luther King believed that all people are ultimately connected. He said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”We are intimately connected.  We cannot continue to ignore a segment of the population and hope the problem will disappear.  Eventually, racism and inequality in education will be detrimental to all.

References

Garcia, S.B. & Ortiz, A.A. (2013). Intersectionality as a framework for transformative

research in special education. Multiple Voices for Ethnically Diverse Exceptional Learners, 13(2) 32­47.

Fast Facts. (n.d.). Fast Facts. Retrieved May 26, 2014, from http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=27

Gould, S. J. (1981). The mismeasure of man. New York: Norton.

Howard, T. C. (2003). Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Ingredients For Critical Teacher Reflection. Theory Into Practice, 42(3), 195-202.

U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics (2013). The Condition of Education 2013 (NCES 2013–037),

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Connie Hahne

Latest posts by Connie Hahne (see all)

• Where is the humanity in education? – June 20, 2014
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