New teachers of color and culturally responsive teaching in an era of educational accountability: Caught in a double bind

The purpose of this article is to examine how and to what extent schools’ responses to accountability policies in the United States influence the ability of new teachers of color to draw on their own and their students’ cultural resources to engage in culturally responsive teaching. A 5-year study of 17 new teachers of color reveals that these teachers identified three principal tensions which correspond to the three dimensions of culturally responsive teaching: (a) cultural and linguistic relevance versus standardization, (b) community of learners versus teacher transmission, and (c) social justice versus enhanced test scores. The teachers also described two mechanisms by which accountability-based programs and policies were enforced: fear of monitoring and internalizing the link between testing and educational opportunity. We applied the metaphor of “double bind” to explain the tensions and enforcement mechanisms encountered by these teachers. The “double bind” forced the new teachers of color to enact contradictory systemic demands promoted by government policy and the teaching profession and exacted an individual toll. We conclude with implications for policy, practice, and research.     

Flexible learning and design of instruction

The paper deals with the problem of designing flexible learning and instruction. Flexibility is considered both from the learner's and the designer's perspective. The potential of telematics in the design, development and implementation of flexible and distance learning is discussed. A Method for flexible instructional modules development is presented which aims at assisting the educational designers in the development of flexible instructional modules, ie, modules, which are easily adaptable to different learner's needs, allow learner's choices and different delivery platforms, including distance delivery. Examples of Method applications and current development of a software system to facilitate the Method's implementation are reported.     

Adolescents at risk for violence

Interpersonal violence among youth is a growing problem in many communities and schools across the nation. The causes of violence are multiple and complex. This paper examines the extent and nature of interpersonal violence among youth as well as the individual and societal factors which contribute to youth violence. Adolescents are disproportionately represented as both victims and perpetrators of fatal and nonfatal assaultive violence. Homicide rates among young men in the United States are vastly greater than those of other Western industrialized nations. Persons age 12–24 years face the highest risk of nonfatal violent victimization of any segment of our society. Arrest rates for homicide, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault peak among adolescents and young adults. Further, arrest rates for murder and other violent crimes have increased substantially among this age group since the mid-1980s. Effective prevention programs will require combinations of interventions aimed at multiple factors and delivered through many channels.     

Effects of narrator gender on conceptual learning

Audiovisual materials for nursing students typically show a female nurse demon-strating activities as they are described (and sometimes directed) by a male narrator. Of obvious concern is the effect of such sex stereotyping on female students. Further, do students (male and female) learn as well from instructional video-tapes narrated by an equally competent female narrator? The investigator sought to control all variables but gender of narrator in this study of conceptual learning from videotapes.