Popularity versus respect: school structure,peer groups and Latino academic achievement

This article begins with a discussion of recent critiques of Fordham and Ogbu’s argument on the ‘burden of acting white’. These critiques point to the stereotypical and homogeneous characterization of the black peer group by Fordham and Ogbu, as well as their inattention to the ways in which schools relegate into the lower tracks those students who behave too ethnically and who do not demonstrate proficiency with dominant cultural attributes. The second half of the article presents data showing that academic achievement is related to peer‐group membership and that schools are largely responsible for which peer group students join. Based on an ethnographic study at a predominantly Latino urban high school, I argue that Latino high achievers do not necessarily experience the ‘burden of acting white’ as Fordham and Ogbu suggest. This was due to the institutional practices at Hernandez High School, which ensured that high achievers and low achievers occupied different academic and social spaces, resulting in little interaction between the groups, and to the very different culture that prescribed the ways in which members of each group could achieve status.     

The problems with colorblind leadership revealed: a call for race-conscious leaders

Abstract

This study addresses the complexity of colorblindness as a phenomenon and explains not only its tenacity, but also potential breaks in its hold on school leadership practice. The authors draw from an interview study of 22 school leaders in a county in the Northeastern USA to examine their perceptions and practices associating with leading schools that enroll students of color. The authors propose a multi-ring model that shows variation among three perspectives: (1) holding to colorblindness, (2) recognition with minimal capacity, and (3) cultivating race-conscious. Perspectives and variation within these three rings are explored, along with consequences for multiple resulting ‘lacks’ in capacity. Implications are offered for building upon race-conscious practice where it exists, removing barriers to implementation, and expanding capacity.     

The Use of Generalizability (G) Theory in the Testing of Linguistic Minorities

We contend that generalizability (G) theory allows the design of psychometric approaches to testing English-language learners (ELLs) that are consistent with current thinking in linguistics. We used G theory to estimate the amount of measurement error due to code (language or dialect). Fourth- and fifth-grade ELLs, native speakers of Haitian-Creole from two speech communities, were given the same set of mathematics items in the standard English and standard Haitian-Creole dialects (Sample 1) or in the standard and local dialects of Haitian-Creole (Samples 2 and 3). The largest measurement error observed was produced by the interaction of student, item, and code. Our results indicate that the reliability and dependability of ELL achievement measures is affected by two facts that operate in combination: Each test item poses a unique set of linguistic challenges and each student has a unique set of linguistic strengths and weaknesses. This sensitivity to language appears to take place at the level of dialect. Also, students from different speech communities within the same broad linguistic group may differ considerably in the number of items needed to obtain dependable measures of their academic achievement. Whether students are tested in English or in their first language, dialect variation needs to be considered if language as a source of measurement error is to be effectively addressed.     

Who Am I? The Social Construction of Ethnic Identity and Self-Perceptions in Latino Preservice Teachers

The Urban Review - Because of the changes in the demographics, it is important for Latino teachers to relate to the educational and psychological needs of language minority children who are...     

Preconceptions and relations used by children in the construction of food chains

This study shows two aspects: the predator–prey relations and the preconceptions held by children (9–10 years old) on the construction of food chains. The subjects of the study were 506 fourth-, fifth-, and sixth-grade children from the Mexican education curriculum. The conclusions are based on a single application of an instrument after a lecture in the classroom. The instrument consists of three tasks. The outcome showed that the classification of herbivorous and carnivorous is based in children's preconceptions of size and ferocity. These preconceptions guide the children's selection of the higher-level predator in the construction of a food chain. Another element used by children is the predator-prey relation in the construction of a food chain. The results shed light on the difficulties students have at higher education levels in the resolution of food webs and the relationships with ecosystems.     

Integrating educational institutions to produce intellectual capital for sustainability in Caguas,Puerto Rico

This research is part of a broader investigation to analyse the processes followed by the Caguas Municipality at the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in an effort to develop the characteristics of a ‘Smart City’ as an example of sustainable development. We describe the integration of the educational institutions’ initiatives and the municipal government strategic plan to contribute to the knowledge and intellectual capital that brings sustainability to the city. An actor's model was designed to represent this integration. The conceptual framework was based on the concepts of knowledge production and sharing as applied to the collaboration between critical representative actors. Field research consisting of in-depth interviews was performed to ascertain the integration processes and their relationship with such processes of knowledge production and sharing. The results showed that the governance paradigm implemented is already empowering the citizens to contribute with intellectual capital that brings sustainability to Caguas.