Natural mentors, racial identity, and educational attainment among african american adolescents: exploring pathways to success

The present study explored how relationships with natural mentors may contribute to African American adolescents’ long‐term educational attainment by influencing adolescents’ racial identity and academic beliefs. This study included 541 academically at‐risk African American adolescents transitioning into adulthood. The mean age of participants at Time 1 was 17.8 (SD = .64) and slightly over half (54%) of study participants were female. Results of the current study indicated that relationships with natural mentors promoted more positive long‐term educational attainment among participants through increased private regard (a dimension of racial identity) and stronger beliefs in the importance of doing well in school for future success. Implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.     

Deaf children from ethnic, linguistic and racial minority backgrounds: an overview

Deaf children from ethnic, linguistic and racial minority backgrounds demonstrate significantly depressed achievement levels relative to their White deaf peers. Educators of deaf children and youth have had a tendency to accept the erroneous proposition that deafness in some ways precludes ethnic and racial minority group membership and status. This article describes some of the unique social and educational realities faced by Black and Hispanic children and their families in the northeastern United States and the similarities experienced by deaf Black and Hispanic children and their families. Implications concerning educational assessment, placement, student expectations, curriculum development, staffing and policy making are noted as are recommendations that resulted from the first national conference on Black and Hispanic deaf youth held in March 1989. Demographic data are also presented showing the growth and distribution in the population of minority deaf children, as well as the results of a survey indicating the dearth of minority personnel, board members and specialized programs in schools.     

Deaf/hearing cultural identity paradigms: modification of the deaf identity development scale

The Deaf Identity Development Scale (Glickman, 1993) was modified to include hearing individuals and examine how hearing and deaf adults identify themselves. Statistical analysis based on 244 deaf, hard-of-hearing, and hearing respondents revealed a significant interaction between hearing status of self and parents on the hearing, marginal, and immersion scales of the modified version but not on the bicultural scale. Codas are more marginalized, less immersed, and similarly 'hearing' in comparison to deaf persons with deaf parents. Hard-of-hearing respondents with deaf parents endorse more hearing values and fewer deaf values in comparison to deaf counterparts and also appear to be more marginalized. There were no significant differences between deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals with hearing parents. Compared to hearing respondents with hearing parents, deaf counterparts were more marginalized, more 'hearing,' and equally 'deaf.' Strong professional affiliation with the deaf community resulted in scores that differed significantly from those for individuals not as strongly affiliated. We discuss implications for identity development.     

On identity, diversity, and educational change

In this article, I discuss two areas of Andy Hargreaves’ scholarship, teachers’ identity and biography and the three periods of educational change spanning the 1960s to 1990s, that have influenced my work as a teacher educator and researcher. I describe research projects, including self-studies, in which I have examined the influence of teachers’ identities and biographies on their beliefs and practices of responding to student diversity. I also explore how the topic of teachers’ identity and biography are integrated into the courses I teach. Additionally, I describe how I have related the three periods of educational change—a period of optimism and innovation, a period of complexity and contradiction, and a period of marketization and standardization, along with the monocultural restoration—to corresponding policies and practices of responding to student diversity in the US and Ontario, Canada. Finally, I discuss a current project in which Andy and I are exploring core issues related to educational leadership and diversity.     

edTPA,videotape, and occupational identity: a study of pre-service teachers

In conducting this study, I sought to contribute to the scholarly discourse of understanding how North American elementary pre-service teachers experienced evaluation via teacher performance assessments. Through extensive interviews and thematic data analysis, this study generally supported the contention that the process of completing edTPA deepened student teachers’ understanding of their educational experience in a number of domains, which in turn suggested a broader awareness and appreciation of the complexities of learning to teach. Data from a larger study indicated that the identified ‘realms of understanding’ fell into four areas of insight related to education: Understanding Children, Understanding Instructional Strategies, Understanding via Collective Learning, and Understanding Self as Teacher. For the purposes of this paper, the identified area of insight ‘Understanding Self as Teacher’ is explored. These findings lead to several practical ways in which teacher education might be improved, particularly in the area of utilization of video in teacher education programs.     

Parental racial socialization as a moderator of the effects of racial discrimination on educational success among african american adolescents

This study investigated whether parental racial socialization practices moderated the relation between racial discrimination in school and adolescents’ educational outcomes. Using data from a longitudinal study of an economically diverse sample of 630 African American adolescents (mean age = 14.5) from a major East Coast metropolis, the results revealed that cultural socialization attenuated the effect of teacher discrimination on grade point average (GPA) and educational aspirations, as well as the effect of peer discrimination on GPA. Also, preparation for bias and cultural socialization interacted to make unique contributions to African American adolescents’ educational outcomes. Finally, there was some evidence that teacher discrimination was more detrimental to the academic engagement of African American males than females. Implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Comparisons in perceived importance of and needs for maternal gestational weight information between african american and caucasian pregnant women

This study compared the perceived importance of and needs for maternal gestational weight information between African American and Caucasian pregnant women. A secondary analysis of data from 113 pregnant women (82 African Americans and 31 Caucasians) attending an inner-city prenatal clinic was conducted for this study. Perceived importance of and needs for information were measured in five areas: (1) nutrition, (2) prenatal vitamins, (3) rest/activity balance, (4) exercise, and (5) appropriate weight gain. African American women demonstrated significantly higher perceived importance of and needs for information on rest/activity balance and appropriate weight gain than Caucasian women. Exercise information was rated lower in importance but was most needed by both African American and Caucasian women. Education programs about maternal gestational weight need to be cognizant of ethnic women's needs.     

Ethnic identity and the daily psychological well-being of adolescents from Mexican and Chinese backgrounds

Protective effects of ethnic identity on daily psychological well-being were examined in a sample of 415 ninth graders from Mexican and Chinese backgrounds. Utilizing daily diary assessments and multilevel modeling, adolescents with a greater regard for their ethnic group exhibited greater levels of daily happiness and less daily anxiety averaged over the 2-week study period. Ethnic regard moderated the daily association between normative stressful demands and happiness, and between stressful demands and happiness experienced 1 day after stressors occurred. Moderating effects were significant even after controlling for self-esteem. Although no buffering effects of ethnic centrality were found, the results point to the positive influence of ethnic regard in the daily lives of adolescents from ethnic minority backgrounds.     

Deaf college students' attitudes toward racial/ethnic diversity, campus climate, and role models

Deaf college students' attitudes toward a variety of issues related to racial/ethnic diversity were surveyed by contacting all racial/ethnic minority deaf students and a random sample of Caucasian deaf students attending the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID), Rochester Institute of Technology; 38% completed the survey. Although racial/ethnic groups similarly perceived NTID's commitment and efforts related to diversity, they differed significantly on some items related to campus climate and role models. Furthermore, the racial/ethnic minority groups differed from each other in their perceptions of campus comfort level, racial conflict, friendship patterns, and availability of role models. Educational satisfaction was positively correlated with campus comfort level; both correlated negatively with perception of discrimination and racial conflict. Qualitative data analyses supported quantitative data analyses and provided rich detail that facilitated interpretation of deaf students' experiences related to racial/ethnic diversity.     

Education and Families in The Spirit of Community: questions of identity,individuality and diversity

ABSTRACT

This paper [1] [1] Sections of this article will appear as part of chapter 1 in Demaine & Entwistle (1996), and some sections were included as part of a paper entitled ‘The politics of identity and the identity of sociology’ presented to the International Sociology of Education Conference on ‘Pedagogy, Identity and the Politics of Difference’ at Sheffield, United Kingdom, 3‐5 January 1996. examines communitarian argument on schools, families and youth culture in Amitai Etzioni's influential book, The Spirit of Community. The paper concludes that in lieu of detailed policy argument Etzioni's readers are presented with appeals to ‘changes of heart’ and a circular (and inconclusive) account of the supposed role of various social institutions in inculcating ‘appropriate moral values’. The paper also discusses Ray Pahl's critique of communitarianism and his account of identity, individuality and diversity in what he refers to as the ‘friendly society’.

     

Social constructivism, projective identity, and learning: case study of nathan

In this paper we consider the significant issue of identity and how it relates to learning. Importantly, we narrow down the study in terms of how projective identity interplays with learning from the point of view of the learner and his/her social community. Self and community cannot be divorced. In order to illustrate this concept, we describe a case study involving an 11 years old boy in a learning context commonly referred to as an informal learning environment. This environment would include the community in which projective identity evolves. The trajectory of identity projection can be conceived in Ricoeurian terms of a plot where actors perform actions in role playing situations. This plot metaphor is consistent to the many interactions within MMPOGs and fictional worlds currently in existence. We conceive of an identity projection framework as our contributions to knowledge.     

Personal persistence,identity development,and suicide: a study of Native and Non-native North American adolescents

The cross-cultural program of research presented here is about matters of temporal persistence--personal persistence and cultural persistence--and about solution strategies for solving the paradox of "sameness-in-change." The crux of this paradox resides in the fact that, on threat of otherwise ceasing to be recognizable as a self, all of us must satisfy at least two constitutive conditions. The first of these is that selves are obliged to keep moving or die, and, so, must continually change. The second is that selves must also somehow remain the same, lest all notions of moral responsibility and any commitment to an as yet unrealized future become nonsensical. Although long understood as a problem demanding the attention of philosophers, we argue that this same paradox arises in the ordinary course of identity development and dictates the different developmental routes taken by culturally mainstream and Aboriginal youth in coming to the identity-preserving conclusion that they and others are somehow continuous through time. Findings from a set of five studies are presented. The first and second studies document the development and refinement of a method for parsing and coding what young people say on the topic of personal persistence or self-continuity. Both studies demonstrate that it is not only possible to seriously engage children as young as age 9 or 10 years in detailed and codable discussions about personal persistence, but that their reasoning concerning such matters typically proceeds in an orderly and increasingly sophisticated manner over the course of their early identity development. Our third study underscores the high personal costs of failing to sustain a workable sense of personal persistence by showing that failures to warrant self-continuity are strongly associated with increased suicide risk in adolescence. Study four documents this same relation between continuity and suicide, this time at the macrolevel of whole cultures, and shows that efforts by Aboriginal groups to preserve and promote their culture are associated with dramatic reductions in rates of youth suicide. In the final study we show that different default strategies for resolving the paradox of personal persistence and change--Narrative and Essentialist strategies--distinctly characterize Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal youth.     

Contemporary dilemmas in american childbirth education: findings from a comparative ethnographic study

In this article, we examine key dilemmas childbirth educators experienced as they made crucial decisions about the content and format of their classes in the current U.S. maternity-care context. This ethnographic study demonstrates that childbirth education is a cultural phenomenon with deeply embedded values regarding the nature and importance of information, scientific evidence, and consumer choice. Articulating how culture shapes the presentation, content, and format of childbirth classes is an important step in understanding and increasing the relevance of this experience for birthing women.     

National identity,patriotism and studying politics in schools: a case study in Hong Kong

After reunification with the People's Republic of China in 1997, Hong Kong was turned into a special administrative region. The new government has repeatedly emphasised the development of national identity and patriotism. One of the locations where these issues might be expected to appear is in the teaching of Government and Public Affairs (GPA), an optional subject offered to secondary students aged 15–18. The aim of this paper is to study the perceptions of GPA teachers in order to address two issues. First, how do GPA teachers who teach politics in schools construe ‘national identity’ and ‘patriotism’? Second, do the teachers believe studying politics through the subject GPA can enhance national identity and patriotism among the students? The findings show that the teachers understand national identity and patriotism critically. They insist politics should be taught in a rational way. At the same time, they think teaching politics in a rational way, with no appeal to the emotions as is the current practice, will enhance neither the students' sense of national identity nor their patriotism.     

African American racial identity across the lifespan: identity status, identity content, and depressive symptoms

Cluster analytic methods were used to create 4 theorized ethnic identity statuses (achieved, foreclosed, moratorium, and diffused) among 940 African American adolescents (13-17 years old), college students (18-23 years old), and adults (27-78 years old). Evidence for the existence of 4 identity statuses was found across the 3 age groups. The distribution of individuals differed by age group, with the older participants disproportionately occupying the more mature statuses. Identity status was related to identity content such that achieved individuals reported higher levels of racial centrality and private regard. Finally, there was a significant interaction between developmental age group and identity status for depressive symptoms such that diffused college students reported higher symptoms than achieved college students. No status differences were found for the other 2 age groups.     

校本课程开发:背景、进展及现状

校本课程开发是1973年由两位学者一次国际课程研讨会上提出的新概念，这一概念得到了诸多国家的学者，教育实践工作者乃至教育行政官员的积极响应。由于各国在政治制度与教育传统上的差异，人们对校本课程开发的理解一表达以及要校本课程开发的形式和内容上也各不同相。本文重点介绍了四个主要的英语国家的校本课程开发的概况以及中国台湾，香港及大陆近期对校本课程开发的关注。